Simeon Tienpont / Team AkzoNobel

gender Male
Amazing sunrise drone shot with AkzoNobel sailing across in front of it. Luke on the helm: I'd say everyone is shattered. It'd be a good word. This has probably been the longest stretch of sleep for people. Unfortunately Brad and I are on watch while everyone else is getting this great sleep. I think in total we've probably had an hour since the start, of solid sleep. But that's the race; it's a short leg. It's part of what we do. Lots of corners, lots of places to see, different countries. Stacking. Drone shot of pulling J1 forward for a sail change. Brad, hanking on the J1, talks about not having sleep. Getting up able to see all the boats. Almost a restart. Feeling hopeful as well. Simeon: Back in the same spot we were 24 hours ago. All compressing in. Leaders are just 5 miles in front, hitting a wall of no pressure. Drone shot with sunrise. Luke: We keep on pushing because if we're going to take the effort to be out here, might as well push and try to win the leg. Doesn't mean too much for overall points for us, but if we're all going to be together and do our last race, we'll do the best we can. Sunrise.High drone shot of AkzoNobel sailing past the wind farm. Nicho talks to Brad about getting rid of the J3 and bring the J2 in a bit. Brad does that. Jules: Not doing too well at the moment. Didn't have too good a run from the buoy up at Norway. Brad hoists the MH0. Simeon, with binoculars: Pretty disappointed. Off the pace; out of sync. Peel. Simeon: Still a long way to go. Everyone's working hard. Getting a little bit of rest now. I don't think anyone slept longer than 40 minutes. This afternoon we'll get into Aarhus, then back up north again. Drone shot with wind farm.Doing a sail change in the cockpit; furling line gets a knot in it (?). They scramble to fix it. Deploying the MH0. Nicolai takes the sail bag forward to bag up the J0 (I think?) Brad fiddles with the halyard. Simeon looks to starboard. Jules: He's only gonna go if Brunel goes. Nicho and Jules talk about when to tack over to port.Slomo parade. Simeon, Nicolai, Luke, Martine, Emily, Jules, Justin (carrying a small child). Dockout. Simeon: This is where I learned sailing. It's going to be good fun. Nicolai on the helm in the prestart talking about their approach. Simeon: "3:20!" On the line, Brunel, Dongfeng, TTToP nearby. Jules calling nav on the upwind with his tablet. Other boats: MAPFRE. Dongfeng just behind. Nicho: Just be a blocker for the next 3 days. Good start by Nicolai. Now get up the coast and probably match these guys a little bit. Good start; just keep trying to put the best foot forward. Jules: Going better now, Nicolai. Nicolai on the helm.Early in the leg, Jules looks at a tablet. Nicho calls "main on". Boats behind them: Dongfeng, TTToP, Scallywag. Pan across the cockpit showing crew sailing the boat upwind: Nicolai on the helm, Martine and Emily (I think) grinding. Justin trimming the J1. Simeon in the pit. Luke sitting just forward of James (the OBR).Simeon in the pit with someone else. Brad below: Think we had some trouble reefing. Not sure exactly what's causing it, but it's not going on the lock. It's a matter of going through a few different processes to see what it is. Go back to full main; see if that fixes it. Simeon, in the pit: Line didn't break did it? Simeon at the mast on the spreader cam: I think it's on. I don't know; we've never had this before. Brad, below: Brunel is half a mile away, so this is costing us. Hope it isn't a problem later on when there's more breeze and we definitely need to reef.Drone shot of Akzo flopping with the J1 as a windseeker. Jules, standing on the mast: Best breeze is through there. Nicho, with binoculars: They're all on port with zeroes. Other boats on the horizon. Nicolai on the helm talks to Simeon about the wind. Nicho: Fastest we've been for about half an hour. Crew sleeping in the bow. Luke: talks about broken sleep because of maneuvers. Going to plug in some music and zone out. Low-alttitude drone shot of Akzo in drifting conditions. Nicho talks to Jules about best heading. Justin: Gotta get out to that line, don't we? Nicho responds about the ridge. Flopping with MH0. Jules: Might be our turn now. Simeon: You wanna come down on this? Other boat (MAPFRE) to starboard. Justin: Just catch it before it dies. Nicho: That way (points ahead) 20 miles there's good southerlies. Talks about MAPFRE next to them; different scenarios as the breeze fills in. High drone shot of the two boats.Slomo of rocks with sea birds flying around them. Sunset. Simeon looking at sunset. Nicolai: South tip of Ireland, beautiful... Bit of a chess game. Can choose to go around, or go between. Talk about wind shadow, tide. Flopping. Dongfeng in sunset light to starboard. Nicolai: We just went outside a small group of islands while the rest of the fleet went inside. Shot of Vestas emerging from behond the islands. Jules talks about wind. Sunset with a competitor ahead of them.Drone shot of AkzoNobel sailing in the sunrise. Simeon: Went through the first night out of Cardiff, and got out with the tide out of the Bristol Channel, and breeze built and shifted right, so making good progress toward Fastnet Rock. A bit of compression at Ireland. Good pressure; cold wind from the north.Slomo parade with kids waving flags. Slomo dockout with Simeon waving from the wheel. Luke: just coming out of the Cardiff lock, just coming down to sea level... Exciting toward the end; "thunderbolts and lightning, very very frightening." Start sequence in drifting conditions. Jules and Nicho talking about a competitor getting a helicopter puff. Jules: Trying to make use of the turning tide here. Sailing offshore into the middle of the channel. Sailing with better wind.Drone shot of AkzoNobel sailing in misty conditions. Brunel on their starboard beam. Jules talks about how it was unlucky we went into 7 knots of wind... Justin interrupts: It's not unlucky it's just [bleep] light. Simeon looks at Brunel through binoculars and talks about their sail combination. Jules: Trying to defend our lead, which is very slim at the moment. Slomo crew work: Grinding, foredeck, steering, stacking. Jules: Still with 350 miles to go you don't wanna get too involved in a straight match race. You don't want to give them free reins to sail past. Staying with him, minimizing the risk, but also sailing the plan to get there as quickly as possible. Slomo crew work: Hoisting a sail. Drone shot.Nicolai below: Still battling with Brunel; never-ending story. Simeon at the nav station: Gaining a bit, losing a bit, different pressure. Trying to get the best sail setup. Trying to cover and hold on. Same old same old. Drone shot with sunset of them peeling to the J0 in strengthening wind. Triple-heading. Bagging the MH0 on the foredeck. Nicho, below: We've lost a little in the last 24 hours to them. We've coughed up a little; that's part of the game in trying to put yourself between the other boat and the mark. Looking like a long match race to the finish. We're in a good position; just need to consolidate it a little in these next few hours. Drone shot circling AkzoNobel under cloudy skies.Flopping in glassy, lumpy conditions. On bow, Emily jokes about how they're no longer going for the 24-hour speed record. It's weird to think that a day ago she was wearing her crash helmet. Though she could use it now to not be hit by the (flopping) foot of the jib. Simeon, on the bow: Quite radical, from some pretty good conditions to basically nothing now. Clouds. Bouwe is right next to us. We see Brunel a few miles away. Justin: It's actually quite pleasant. And everyone's getting it (i.e., the other boats are stopped too). On the helm, Nicolai: It's not too bad. We've been in it before... You can't stress about it. You're not going to go any faster if you hoist every sail on the boat. Have a cup of tea and go again tomorrow when the breeze fills in. Pretty sure no matter what happens, Bouwe's not going to do 600 miles in 24 hours. I'll take that.Simeon, in the pit: For sure Martine is excited, so she can call her father Captain Slow at the dinner table. Also Jules has a nice grin on his face to redo his own record from Ericsson 4. But we just want to be first in to Cardiff. Weather is still a bit challenging... It's great of course to be the fastest in the race, especially in this kind of conditions where we can do it pretty safe, and big compliments to the shore crew to maintain the boat so well, so we have the confidence to put the hammer down. It's pretty cool. It will be hard to win the race overall, but at least we won't be the slowest, hopefully.Jules at the nav station: In the 2008 race we almost topped 600 miles in the Ericsson 4. That was in the South Atlantic on the first leg. Had a few sail changes. This was more straightforward. This is really good what we've done here. Think we've topped 600 miles... keeps us in the front of the fleet. You always try to line your boat up, but you need so many things to come into line. Had some help from the Gulf Stream in this one. Boat stayed in one piece. On Ericsson we damaged a rudder and started sinking. But in this case the numbers keep coming.Simeon, in the pit: For sure Martine is excited, so she can call her father Captain Slow at the dinner table. Also Jules has a nice grin on his face to redo his own record from Ericsson 4. But we just want to be first in to Cardiff. Weather is still a bit challenging... It's great of course to be the fastest in the race, especially in this kind of conditions where we can do it pretty safe, and big compliments to the shore crew to maintain the boat so well, so we have the confidence to put the hammer down. It's pretty cool. It will be hard to win the race overall, but at least we won't be the slowest, hopefully.Jules at the nav station: In the 2008 race we almost topped 600 miles in the Ericsson 4. That was in the South Atlantic on the first leg. Had a few sail changes. This was more straightforward. This is really good what we've done here. Think we've topped 600 miles... keeps us in the front of the fleet. You always try to line your boat up, but you need so many things to come into line. Had some help from the Gulf Stream in this one. Boat stayed in one piece. On Ericsson we damaged a rudder and started sinking. But in this case the numbers keep coming.Brad, at the nav station, grins and gives a thumbs up. "Beauty! Just got the 24 hour record Just got the confirmation from the boss." Simeon, in his bunk: Let's see if we can get over the 600. Brad talks to Nicho in the cockpit about beating Ericcson's record. "You gotta give me a fist for that." He holds out his fist. Nicho pulls his fist away and they laugh. Nicolai in his bunk: This is what it's about. It's hard and exhausting, and you're tired but it's why you want to do the race. Go as fast as you can for days and days, there's no limits... She's a fast boat, this purple bus. She's got some pace to her. I like it. She's a good boat. It's pretty cool; I didn't know that. It's good news to wake up to. Our main focus is still the leg. Gotta keep ourselves in line for the podium. Helmsperson raises his fist, make a peace sign, then a thumbs up. Martine laughs on the pedestal.Slomo washing machine. Slomo of Nicolai's face with red eyes. Nicolai below: It's fast and furious these two or three days now. running and reaching with big sails. Brunel is doing it the same. Are pushing it. Full on. Driving is a little bit hard, and your eyes are bleeding every time you go off watch. But that's part of it, it's good fun. The faster the better and the more fun it is. Hopefully one more day of fast sailing before the wind drops off. Slomo washing machine. Nicolai: Currently sitting in second, fighting with Brunel. And it's the same on the leader board. They're not going to give up and neither are we. Footage from the stern cam, mast cam looking forward, spreader cam looking at the cockpit, as they sail fast. Nicolai takes his clothes off below. Nicolai: It's pretty heinous on board. It's actually worse down here than it is up there. You don't want to walk around; you'll get hurt. Get some food and jump in your bunk pretty quickly. Nicolai eating, getting in his bunk. Simeon at the nav station: Everyone is in some good breeze. Last 6 hours we did 147 miles. So that's pretty big for these boats. We're going pretty well; had some current with us that helps a bit. At the moment the boatspeed doesn't drop below 24 knots. This is the last chance in the race. After Cardiff won't be doing this. Nav station.Drone shot of AzkoNobel triple-heading under gray skies. Slomo washing machine in the cockpit. Martine gets doused at the pedestal. Below, Nicho, Jules, and Simeon look at weather models on the computer. Jules: Mixed bag performance wise. Had some good spells and some not so good spells. Crossed a bit of the Gulf Stream. Radar, AIS; he was short on sleep all night. Drone shot. Spray by the shrouds. Simeon getting greared up below. Some good moments, some difficult moments. Keep the hammer on. Nicho takes slomo spray. Major whitewater near the mast looking aft. This is when the boats are most powerful. Jules at the nav station looks at routing. "Still a long way to go, changing conditions. The forecasts not really lining up." More slomo washing machine, drone shot of AkzoNobel surfing.Parade. Simeon holding a little girl. Justin kissing a young child he's holding. Dockout. Nicho: Double pointer, only 8 days. People think it's short, but if you push it hard you feel it. Start. Brad: "Good breeze here." Other boats behind them. TTToP crossing astern at mark rounding. (Think that's the port-starboard between Vestas and TTToP behind them.) leeward mark rounding. Vestas astern. Nicolai on the helm going downwind under the bridge with MAPFRE and Dongfeng (and Brunel, invisible) ahead of them. Vestas 3 boatlengths to starboard. Simeon: Thinks they did well, except at the top mark. Felt my heart beating in my throat there. Now out of the bay into the fog. MAPFRE behind them. Jules: third place at the moment. Just trynig to wriggle our way around the exclusion zone. Discussion of J0 vs. J1.Sunrise. Drone shot of Akzo sailing by. Nicho on the helm talking to Nicolai. Justin: Before the sun got up was very light. Wind direction about 145. Waiting for about 165 before we can gybe. Instruments. Justin: On the last sched lost about 10 miles to the other boats. Better pressure before us, and that's just the way it is. Luke, below: We are gybing toward Newport, so moving the stack quickly over. easier to throw things downhill. Nicho on the helm talks about the gybe. Stacking on deck. We see the gybe. Simeon: Heading in the right direction. Busy upcoming 30 hours. Been a difficult leg so far, so hopefully we can have a little luck our way and have a better result. At least we've got a lucky Irish OBR.Low-alttiude drone shot. Nicolai: It's all about the last 24 hours. We're coming in fresh. Just go around them. Drone shot from above. Emiily: Passing by Bermuda. Which I think everyone knows by now is where I'm from, because I've been talking about it all week. I haven't been home for a year. So it's pretty cool for me to pass by. Give a wave. Simeon: During the watch we'll come into lighter pressure in the high. Once we sort of 90 degrees with the high pressure we've gotta gybe off. It will be tomorrow before we do that gybe. Drone shot.Wet shots on the foredeck: Luke and Simeon rigging for a sail change. Justin and Emily in the pit. Luke at the clew. Brad: Just left the doldrums, but it was harsh on us. Coughed up quite a few miles to the other boats. A little down at the moment, but we'll be back up. Now we're in 15-20 knots, tight reaching. Nicolai, below, eats something tubular. "Maybe not. Put that back." He wraps it up. He talks to Emily in the bunk above him about food.Simeon: Have been 70% of the way around the world, and haven't seen any wildlife. Just a few random dolphins. 12 or 13 years ago I remember a lot more; orcas, big whales... I don't know, it's the time of year or could be we need to find a biologist and get a proper explanation. Nicho, on the helm: You always hope it's better than it is, but the impact... The difference is quite scary. In certain areas you'd see schools of dolphins, 200, 300 of them. Albatrosses, dozens of them circling the boat in the Southern Ocean. This time it's been scary how little. Martine: 15,000 miles of sailing, and haven't seen... Nicho: It is a worry. Hopefully up here in the Gulf Stream we'll see rapid improvement. Nicolai: Main reason most of us do this race is to see the world, see wildlife, see the cities. But seeing pollution is dramatic. Hopefully we can turn the tide. Martine: Talks about the loss of wildlife. Emily: This is how nature resets itself. Probably won't happen in our lifetime. Seeing a huge decline in animals on land and out here. We're messing up, bigtime.Drone shot of the rig. Closeup of the outrigger. Nicolai: Talks about one design, same sails. It all comes down to how you set up the sails, small adjustments. Maybe gain 0.01 knots of boatspeed. But over a week that's going to pay off. Shots of the sails. Nicolai explains the outrigger. He explains that it's like an airplane wing: At high speed want it flat, at low speed/low wind want it deep and powerful. Simeon: Look a lot at the heel trim. The longitudinal trim. And the shape, the amount of wetted surface. But also the stability. In light air we're not planing, so we want that fat ass out of the water. So we trim forward. Nicolai talks to someone below about the stack below. Simeon talks about the foils, keel, lift vs. drag. Like how we trim the sails, we basically trim the hull as well. Stacking below, close drone shot. Stacking sails forward. Jules talks about the other boats, and then the instruments, as the gauge they look at. Art vs. science. Helmsman's feel.Radar shows a cloud. Night time crew work. Simeon: "Tack coming off, Nicolai!" "Can we have the jib on here?" Simeon, below, explains that they can see the rain showers coming by on the radar. They can see, like now, when the cloud has gone over and sucked all the wind away, so they switch to a bigger sail. Someone (Justin?) talks with Brian about the massive cloud sucking up all that energy. Lightning. Nicolai: I think it's day 5... I miss the Southern Ocean. Sail flopping. "And it's warm. I hate the warm."Simeon: It was a hectic night; hit some good squalls. Crash cam footage at night of them easing sheets. Simeon says the fleet is in a line west to east. Trying to stick their neck out and be the first one to go around the corner of Brazil. Drone shot from overhead. Simeon: That's the cool thing of this sport is motivate yourself. Everyone is tired, but it gives energy when everyone is into it. You don't have it always right, but when you have it right it's good teamwork. Hopefully we can keep it up for a week and be mentally, physically stronger than the rest of the teams. And a bit lucky, and it can make a difference. Justin: It's the first time I've seen them headed. Simeon: Nothing comes without energy. Lots of energy. It's a game of human performance. Everyone is almost as fast as each other. Pushing all the way to the Hague.Time lapse from the stern cam as darkness falls. Simeon, below, talks about the wind dropping and going right. Probably will do the stack and get on the hip of those guys. Below, Martine and Brad stacking. Jules at the nav station. Night shot of stars, moon. Luke, in the dark, explains that they're right on the crossover of the J1 and the Masthead 0, and it's difficult to know if they should change or not, if the better sail will pay for the loss incurred in the sail change. "Where we are in the fleet at the moment we can't afford to make any losses."Time lapse below of Martine (I think?) getting into her bunk. Simeon at the nav station: Whole fleet is close to each other; 4 or 5 miles. Increase of wind in the night, but very unstable. Pretty busy on deck. Sails on/sails off. At the moment we're making good progress. Probably will tack in the next couple of hours, whenever Jules is happy.Parade follows Simeon and Nicolai, intercut with starting line shots. Martine kisses her dad good bye. Dockout. Starting line, with Vestas, Dongfeng, and TTToP. Brunel behind them. Scallywag right behind. Scallywag ducks them at a mark rounding. Jumper jumps off. Simeon: I think we had a good plan on the start. But just a few seconds after the start it's such a critical position. Fell back. But recovered well. Middle fleet. Nicolai helmed well. We're rolling Turn the Tide now; we'll keep close to the top to guys so uh- (And then the video cuts off. Um, Brian?)Closeups of water leaking out from something below. Simeon explains: He noticed when he was going to light the fire for cooking. Water was squirting out of the cover plate of the keel box. Nicolai talking with him. Brad gets out gear to go for a little swim. "Just jump in for a quick swim and see what I can find." On deck in the pre-dawn. Brad goes down in a survival suit, it looks like, with goggles. He pulls himself down to the keel. Calls for slack. Brad comes back: Two cover plates for the keel box. There's a gaping hole about that big in the bottom of our boat. Should be sealed here (inside). Going to have to come up with a way to sail the boat without pushing water inside the boat. Simeon: A bit of slamming, because of the big speeds, broke part of the cover plate of the keel. Simeon, Jules, and Nicolai discuss. Nicolai on the phone, asking about reinforcing with battens on the inside. Simeon: Keep an eye on it, maybe make some reinforcements. They remove the cover plate inside. Fiddle with reinforcements. Reattaching the cover plate. Beautiful sunset drone shot. Simeon: Not so much a repair as much as a reinforcement. "We think this will bring us to Itajai safely, and otherwise I'll have to sit on top of it."Jules, at the nav station, talks about the wind and confused sea state. Spreader cam views of washing machine on deck. Crash cam view of Nicho (based on his foulies lettering) getting washed off the helm by a wave. Below, Brad talks to Nicolai about his nose; Nicolai says he's broken it before, then pushes it back into place. Nicolai, below, talks about getting beaten up by the waves. He broke his nose last night. But nothing too serious. Jules and Simeon at the nav station talk about strategy. Nicho: Got washed off the wheel. First one I've had. Held on tight. I had two tethers on, just got washed back on my ass on the boat. Crash cam footage of the washing off again. Jules: We've also slowed down a bit. TTToP slowed down a bit due to rig issues, and Vestas has just been dismasted in this same area. Standing by... Simeon: Especially for Vestas, a tough time for those guys. Jules: At the moment hard to go max speed because of the sea state, and fear of breaking the boat. Talks about the upcoming route. A bit of a tradeoff; trying to get north as quickly as they can but also as safely as they can.AkzoNobel closes in on Cape Horn. As they leave it behind, Simeon talks about how it's good to get past it. Have to give everything now and try to catc up with the guys in the lead. Slomo of Cape Horn with the binnacle in the foreground. Nicolai: Happy to be here in one piece. Hard to get to. Nicho, on the pedestal: Used to see this stuff as a kid in books, early explorers. Never imagined doing it himself. But now he has 5 times. It's why he has all the gray hair. Closeup of Cape Horn.Simeon, below, tells about receiving the message from Scallywag about the loss of John Fisher ("Fish"). He expresses condolences, and wishes strength to the crew on board Scallywag. He knows how difficult it is in this situation. Hopes to see them safely on shore very soon. Best wishes to them from Team AkzoNobel.Spreader cam view of AkzoNobel surfing and stuffing the bow. Below, Simeon recaps the last 48 hours; busy, gybing, changing sails. 2000 miles to Cape Horn. Point Nemo. Brad: Talks about Point Nemo and the space station. Simeon: What to ask the astronaughts on the space station? Emily wonders if it's easier to go to the toilet on the space station than it is on a Volvo boat. Luke: Jealous. Their stacking technique must be far superior to ours. Simeon: what they have for dinner. Nicolas: They go to the toilet like we do, they eat freeze-dried like we do, they don't sleep much, have a pretty cool view. So I pretty much see myself as an astronaut these days. Simeon: Must be a pretty impressive view. We have an impressive view of the ocean, and of the stars when the clouds let them through. But their view must be even better. Stern cam view of Martine on the pedestal as they surf.Charles, at nav station: In 30 hours we'll enter very strong conditions. Can't carry the fractional in those conditions, so will need to work out good sail combination. Goal is not to break the boat. A very tough leg. Strong wind, and full downwind with many gybes. I do have stress of course. Because you have the responsibility of the people and the boat. But you still want to fight for the first place. It's a balance between speed and safety. When we have 40 knots we know what sail to use. But then we have a gust to 55, and we have to react. But that's part of the Volvo Ocean Race. Horace talks below in Mandarin. Pascal, at nav station, talks in French while demonstrating something involving chart/routing software.Spreader cam view of AkzoNobel surfing and stuffing the bow. Below, Simeon recaps the last 48 hours; busy, gybing, changing sails. 2000 miles to Cape Horn. Point Nemo. Brad: Talks about Point Nemo and the space station. Simeon: What to ask the astronaughts on the space station? Emily wonders if it's easier to go to the toilet on the space station than it is on a Volvo boat. Luke: Jealous. Their stacking technique must be far superior to ours. Simeon: what they have for dinner. Nicolas: They go to the toilet like we do, they eat freeze-dried like we do, they don't sleep much, have a pretty cool view. So I pretty much see myself as an astronaut these days. Simeon: Must be a pretty impressive view. We have an impressive view of the ocean, and of the stars when the clouds let them through. But their view must be even better. Stern cam view of Martine on the pedestal as they surf.Charles, at nav station: In 30 hours we'll enter very strong conditions. Can't carry the fractional in those conditions, so will need to work out good sail combination. Goal is not to break the boat. A very tough leg. Strong wind, and full downwind with many gybes. I do have stress of course. Because you have the responsibility of the people and the boat. But you still want to fight for the first place. It's a balance between speed and safety. When we have 40 knots we know what sail to use. But then we have a gust to 55, and we have to react. But that's part of the Volvo Ocean Race. Horace talks below in Mandarin. Pascal, at nav station, talks in French while demonstrating something involving chart/routing software.Cool low-altitude drone shot that pulls up to reveal AkzoNobel sailing toward the drone. Drone shot above and astern, tracking with them. Simeon, bundled, talks about being in first position. Getting colder, good sailing conditions. Every watch you can feel the temperature drop. Jules, below in the dark, talks with Nicho about the wind and models. Nicho in his bunk, talking to Jules at the nav station. Jules: Crossed the dateline. In a different hemisphere. Fleet pretty close together, within a few miles, bar one boat (Scallywag). In 12 hours some big winds, 30 - 40 knots, and then for the next week. So pretty big stuff coming up. Favorited mostly for that really nice drone sequence at the beginning.Parade out to the boat; conch being blown. Simeon steers with one hand and waves with the other as they leave the dock. Brad, on the bow, talks about a lot of emotions but trying to keep the eyes on the prize. Auckland put on a great show. Hard to leave it to be honest. Start, with AkzoNobel ducking the fleet on port. Nicolai on the helm: "Okay; we're racing." Brad hiking. Sailing upwind with other boats crossing (all the other boats in the shot). Brad hoisting the A3 as they approach the weather mark. Rouding the weather mark. Shot of TTToP screwing up; heeling bigtime with their A3 not deployed (keel position issue?). Gybing, running. Simeon talks about leaving Auckland, nice conditions at the start. Going into the open ocean now. Slomo spray as they go to weather. Slomo on the foredeck as they pack the A3, while sailing to weather under the J1.Parade out to the boat; conch being blown. Simeon steers with one hand and waves with the other as they leave the dock. Brad, on the bow, talks about a lot of emotions but trying to keep the eyes on the prize. Auckland put on a great show. Hard to leave it to be honest. Start, with AkzoNobel ducking the fleet on port. Nicolai on the helm: "Okay; we're racing." Brad hiking. Sailing upwind with other boats crossing (all the other boats in the shot). Brad hoisting the A3 as they approach the weather mark. Rouding the weather mark. Shot of TTToP screwing up; heeling bigtime with their A3 not deployed (keel position issue?). Gybing, running. Simeon talks about leaving Auckland, nice conditions at the start. Going into the open ocean now. Slomo spray as they go to weather. Slomo on the foredeck as they pack the A3, while sailing to weather under the J1.Simeon talks about the latest sched with Jules at the nav station. Close to North Cape of New Zealand. Everyone lining up behind them. Scallywag still in stealth mode. They'll probably use their stealth mode card in the next sched. Some light air expected at north end of New Zealand. Jules, on deck, says technically they're leading. Pretty evenly matched with Scallywag. Brad: Having the lead for most of the last two weeks has been pressure. As Kiwis want to win the leg into Auckland. Cecile: Auckland is my second home. It would mean the world to me to win in Auckland. Shots of crew sleeping, the instruments, sunset. Jules, Simeon, and Nicho at the nav station talking strategy. Nicho: 18 miles in the lead; pretty much point and shoot now. Trying to get around the corner while the tide is good. Then a parkup on the other side. On deck in the sunset, Brad talks about the upcoming situation. Shot of islands in the fading light (the "Three Kings", maybe?). Sunset sky.Nicho on the helm at sunrise. Simeon: Basically the plan is working out, which is nice. Heading more and more to New Zealand. A little more pressure. Coming from underneath, which was alwyas the plan. Sailing more miles, but doing them quicker. Shots of them triple-heading on port gybe. Simeon: In a strong position now; wouldn't want to trade with anyone else. In good shape heading toward New Zealnd, and then the last 400 miles in are very light. Cecile coils. Justin, below, talks about how it's been a long slog. Timing the approach; time and tide. Fingers crossed; keep pushing. Brad, Nicolai in the cockpit. Stacking the sails aft. Grinding. Nicho with his penguin balaclava. Nicho below: staring the weather to death on the computer, so we're prepared. To be in a position to win a leg is a very special thing. It's a rare, rare, rare occurrence... Enjoy every moment you can, because you may not have another. Simeon looks at the latest sched; talks about Scallywag being in stealth mode. 25 (miles?) more than Brunel, 24 more than Dongfeng. Jules and Simeon talk at the nav station. Sunset through the companionway silhouetting a crewmember.Sailing south fast. Pole shots of the crew in the cockpit. Simeon on the helm. Double-heading with J0/J3? Cecile grinding. Simeon at the nav station reads a sched (or AIS?) of Scallywag's position. Jules: just passing the southern end of New Caledonia. Sailing a little further to avoid light air. Still heading south. Brad pulls a sail out from below. Sail change on the foredeck. Slomo washing machine. Simeon: Gained some bearing. Luke, below: Weather could allow Dongfeng and MAPFRE to cut the corner. Still anyone's race. Brad and Luke rock out, sharing a pair of earbuds. Jules and Simeon at the nav station. Jules talks about using the J0 now to give up some distance. Nicho talks about how they can do some things with Scallywag, but not with Dongfeng and MAPFRE because they're too far away. Can't get caught up in that. Pole shot of stacking the A3?Simeon talks about how they're in a good position. Everyone is coming into their trail. Nicolai, below: Only 3 days to go. Starting to see a good result. But reminding yourself it's not over until you cross the finish line. Can put in 22 days of hard work and lose it in the last day. Simeon at the nav station looks at routing software. Everyone is trying to get west; but they're already there. Relief that we went into the light air in first, and are coming out first as well. Luke, on the rail: Re-taken the lead. Tough struggle with Scallywag, it's paid off. Brunel in stealth mode now. Cecile: Nice to get moving. Most pressure we've seen in 3 or 4 days. Luke: Rather be on this boat than any of the others, but it is yacht racing. Pole cam shots over the side of them sailing faster. Chart software showing them west of New Caledonia. Brad eating. Closeups: Helm, winches. Martine on the helm. Simeon trimming. Stacking below. Brad grinding.Early morning. Jules talks about how they can see Scallywag now. They've taken about 10 miles from them in an hour and a half. Bow with stack on it. Nicho looks toward Scallywag. Jules, at the nav station, talks about 1400 miles (to go in the leg?). About 1500 miles of sailing. Jules talking strategy. Cecile talking about how she's glad she picked this boat to be on because they're in a good spot. Still a ways to go. Until you get to North Cape with a decent lead, I won't think about anything. Jules and Simeon at the nav station look at the latest sched. Nicolai in the companionway talks about the competion. Luke talks about how they had a great sched. Talks about New Caledonia, how the other boats are picking different lines. Cecile with a hand-bearing compass. Nicolai, below: Four miles to Scallywag. Three weeks of work behind it, and can lose it in one cloud... Coming together more. Speed, experience, teamwork. Adds up. Jules, Simeon, and Nicho talking around a tablet. Sailing south in light conditions.Martine, on deck, talks in Portuguese about the doldrums, the heat. Simeon, sitting on the lowered J1 on the bow, talks in Dutch about the islands they're passing as the MH0 flops behind him.Nicolai: Good-looking morning. "Cloud porn." You shouldn't be looking at me; you should be looking at the clouds. Cloud shots. Nicho on the helm silhouetted by the sunrise. Crepuscular rays. Simeon: The heat is just unbearable. 45 degrees downstairs. Luke: Big hat, balaclava. Down below it's incredibly hot, hard to sleep during the day. Brad: Water on your skin. Martine: It's hard when you don't have shade. Fan below. Wetting a cloth in the galley. Nicolai drinking. Martine spritzing herself. Nicolai gives a thumbs-down from his bunk. Grinding in the heat on deck. Sunscreen. Flopping in no wind. Justin: Clouds are the only source of wind. We're hopping from cloud to cloud. Light winds. Justin: That one's sucking. Cecile: Talks about the competition. Who's ahead. For sure they've caught up. Game on. Simeon talks about the competition. Jules talks about strategy. Simeon: Challenge for me is still to win a leg in the Volvo Ocean Race. I've come in second quite a few times. Sunset as they're moving again.Scallywag sails a half mile away to leeward (port) of them in the sunrise. Simeon jokes about it. Nicolai eats: Next 48 hours really important. Whoever gets through the best will do best. Each time they've been next to Scallywag in this leg they've beaten them. Nicho: It's good to have a boat next to you. Easy to lose from here; will be difficult to win. But have a good chance at it. Which is more than you can ask for in this race. Shot of Scallywag astern. Jules talks strategy below. Nicho: Had good breeze throughout the sched. But the disadvantage of two boats side by side is you stick together. Crew drinking. Nicho: "I'm from Australia, it's not a problem. The guy from Denmark, he really struggles." He wakes up Nicolai. Nicolai talks about the sun and heat. Simeon, below. Jules: "We're not doing anything at the moment. We're not in the wind, we're losing to him, we're not sailing to our plan, and we're sailing slowly." Hoisting the J1; lowering the MH0. Cecile talks about losing the lead to Scallywag. Simeon in the red light of the sunset: Very expensive. Nothing you can do about it now. Knew west was best in both models. Try to keep west... Try to put yourself in a good position... Should have been more aggressive. Learned a lesson today. Sunset.Brad, up the mast wearing a GoPro (realize it's a Garmin), looks for wind, calls down to the deck. View from deck level as they flop. Knotmeter: 1.6. Hoisting the J1. Luke stands by the MH0 clew. Luke: Brad's just up the mast to pop the battens. GoPro shot of Brad doing that. Luke: 2/3 of the distance through the leg, Scallywag just 4 miles away. Simeon: Brunel, Scallywag, and ourselves. Cecile: Hopefully the guys behind us get stuck in the same stuff. Shot of another boat on the horizon. Martine takes a bearing. Jules talks about "going over there to get in that breeze. Luke looks through the binoculars. Simeon talks down into the cabin: "Need to get more snacks. Keep up the motivation. Luke lies below. Nicolai eats. Simeon: All short-term plans. Luke: Sea state is calm. Going to get flatter as well. Winch closeup. Sunset.Wrestling sails on the foredeck. Pole shot of waves off the side. Lowering and gathering in the J1. Stacking. Looking up the slot while double-heading with a reefed main. Below, Simeon, Jules, and Nicho talk strategy at the nav station. Nicho isn't talking much. Cecile eating. Simeon: Basically leading the fleet. But have to make a decision between two different models for how to round Fiji. Go 800 miles more? A bit of a situation. The weather has been different from the models. Nicho: Have the option of bailing out if they need to. Simeon: As the lead boat have to make a crucial decision. Nicho: Have a reasonable lead, but you can never have enough lead when entering the doldrums. Simeon eases a sheet. Justin on the helm. Luke on the helm as dusk falls, the wind lighter. Beautiful red sunset clouds. "End of the world."Justin looks at clouds. Talks about the wind. Simeon on the helm looks tired. Rainbow to leeward. Justin: Basically have been bouncing from cloud to cloud. Playing snakes and ladders with the other boats. Puffs that last for 30 seconds to a minute. Brad on the bow as they hoist the J1 and furl the MH0. Justin on the helm. Rain. Stacking below. Jules looks at the computer. "Until we find some wind out of the westerly quadrant we won't make any gains." Sailing into the doldrums now. Guys behind have all seen them slow and have turned left (east), taking a lot of miles out of them. Luke: Jules and Chris and Simeon have spent a lot of time over the last week deciding where to cross the doldrums. Jules at the mast. Nicolai and Martine lower the MH0 after hoisting the J1. Lowering the J1, Justin gathers it in on the foredeck. Jules emerges from below to annouce the sched: Brunel is closest to the finish now. Brad in the sunset. Justin on the helm after sunset: Dismal couple of days. Who knows what's next.Simeon talks below. Fantastic to lead. Long way to go. Have to have confidence. Upcoming doldrums. Jules at the nav station talks to Simeon. Computer screen shows weather. Simeon: Pressure of being in the front and making choices that everyone else sees. A bit of a vulnerable spot. Justin, below: A lot of hurdles to get through. Maybe first into the doldrums, first out of the doldrums. Everyone working well. Good feeling. Cecille: Nothing's set in stone. Far from it. Washing machine shot of the cockpit from the cabin. Slomo spray from the cockpit. Nicolai getting drenched. Waterline pole shot. Slomo of cockpit. Pole shots from outboard. Nicho on the helm in rain and squally conditions. Simeon grinding. Looking up the slot with major firehose action. Martine and Jules grinding on one pedestal. Cecile: "It's wet! But fast." Nicolai, below, talks about blowing out a Cunningham ram. Losing oil for the Navtec system. Nicolai and Simeon working on the hydraulics below. Nicolai explains that the bigger problem is that the cunningham uses the same oil as the other systems. If they run out of oil it will affect other sail control systems. More shots of repairs as they bounce around.Cécille, below, talks about how Jules strategy has paid off and they've picked up 40 miles on the other boats in one sched. Still a massive way to go and doldrums and stuff, but it's cool. Jules, at the nav station, looks at a chart. Jules, in the hatch, talks to Nicho, in the cockpit, about strategy. Nicho: Last two scheds are the two best scheds we've ever had. Now put some miles on Scallywag. And still some concern about Brunel and TTToP, with a little bit of leverage. "Minefield after minefield from here to New Zealand." When they were behind they were looking at these upcoming transitions as the opportunity to get past the leaders. So have to be careful. But still, rather be here than back there. Simeon trimming, Martine on the pedestal. Nicho (I think?) steering; Nicolai trimming.Nicho, below, talks about how cool it was last night pushing in 28 knots of wind. Can't talk on deck; just focus on your job. When the front that they're on breaks down there will hopefully be some compression. Pressure on the team, and has been since they damaged the mast in Leg 3. He thinks they're a better team than where they're sitting overall. Nicolai, below, talks about Simeon getting blown off the wheel, making a big bang. "Only one thing can make a bang that big, and that's him falling off the wheel." He just ran for the wheel and grabbed it. Crash cam footage of the incident. Simeon: "Reminds me of when I fall out of a tree as a young boy." At the nav station, Jules talks to Nicho about Dongfeng doing a peel; maybe that's why they fell back. Nicho: "We're just quick Jules." Jules: "The other two are quicker." Nicho laughs. Washing machine shots on deck, closeup of the rudder. Cool fisheye perspective shots. Stacking, shot from outside the lifelines with a GoPro on a pole. Slomo washing machine. Spray. Brad grinding. Someone (Luke?) gives a thumbs up. "Finally moving!"Simeon looks at Scallywag, sailing a quarter mile astern and to leeward. Simeon talks about sailing north, away from New Zealand. Talks wind and clouds with Nicho on the helm. Nicho looks for shadows of clouds. Martine on the helm. Nicolai on the helm, waving "goodbye" to Scallywag. Justin talks about staying in touch with Scallywag. Jules talks about a front coming. They flop in light conditions Shifting the stack forward. Nav station. Brad on deck as they go slow. Luke on the helm: points out the front behind them; expecting big things in the nxt three or four hours. Martine, Simeon putting on foulies. Sailing in more wind. Simeon in the pit; Cecille on the pedestal. Sail changes as it gets dark. Looks like J1 going up, MH0 coming down?Sailing in light winds, crew on the foredeck for weight. Then hoisting a new sail. Closeup of the knotmeter on the mast. Coiling line in the pit. Simeon: "Normal day at the office. Crew gatehring the J1 bare-headed on the bow. Crash cam footage of big wave washing over the cockpit. Bow cam, mast cam. Spreader cam view of reefing the main. Brad, below, recounts the big breeze, over 30 knots, then died down almost completely. Then relatively quickly straight to the J2, a couple of reefs in the main. Now up to 40 knots. In the space of about 4 hours saw everything. Windward rudder repair; Brad explains that it had become loose. Shot of nav software; Jules explains the situation. A windy, gusty night; some shipping as well. Concerns about islands in their path. Jules talking to Simeon about tacking. Nicho says a big bearing change on Scallywag. "Dongfeng's the one I'm interested in." Night vision stern cam view of crew tacking (?). Jules towels off his head at the nav station.Simeon gives a recap from the nav station. Bouncing upwind, everyone very close. Cat and mouse game; Brunel a little ahead. Lost a few miles during the J1 -> J2 change. That's the hardest change, getting the J1 away. Shot of them sailing upwind. Brunel to weather; three other boats astern. MAPFRE to leeward. Slomo of MAPFRE. Nicho on the helm. Jules at the nav station, talking about changing to the J2 before it gets dark. Red-light shot of the crew grinding. Shot of them going to weather with the J1 up. J1 being hoisted. Brad wresting a sail on the foredeck. Nicolai in the pit, then on the foredeck.Dockout. Brad clasps hands with people on the dock as they pull out. Simeon waves from the wheel. Prestart as they unfurl the MH0. Unzipping the J1 bag. Jules calling time to the start. "Racing with a header." Nicolai, on the wheel: "Racing." Dongfeng astern of them, Brunel (with Scallywag unfurling their MH0 visible beyond) sails down from above and behind them; TTToP and MAPFRE visible beyond them. Brad, looking to weather, calls wind: "Max pressure in 10." Pinching up to lee-bow Scallywag. Furling the MH0 to tack. Simeon in the pit, grinding with Cécille. Cécille with her Kiwi-accented English: "Light patch in 2. Building again in 5." She recaps their good start. Martine bagging the MH0 on the foredeck. Simeon, on the rail, talks about the building wind they'll likely see. He's happy to be leading, but points out they have 6,200 miles to go. Clip cuts off in mid-sentence.Distant drone shot of AkzoNobel. Drone shot of the cockpit from overhead. Shot of the crew in the cockpit. Simeon, below, sys they're 3 days from Hong Kong, a little less breeze than they wanted. A couple of gybes in the last 48 hours to seek some more pressure to the south, which was unfortunate because they'd committed to the north earlier. Trying to defend against MAPFRE. Drone flyby of an interesting-looking motor vessel, painted white and about 100' long; numbers "BJ4979" painted on the side. It's a tuna longliner; see https://www.wcpfc.int/node/16813. As the drone passes it we see AkzoNobel in the background. In the cockpit, Brad and Nicolai talk. Brad: "What's your favorite movie quote?" Nicolai: "Favorite movie quote?" He thinks. Brad: "I think I know what it is... Yours would be: 'I'm not a smart man. But I know what love is." [Forrest Gump.] Nicolai: "That's a good one." Another drone shot of the fishing boat, showing the crew working in the area forward of the cabin. Brad: "'Are you not entertained?'" [Gladiator.]Nicolai, on deck: "You are going to have good and bad days when you do the Volvo Ocean Race, and you're more likely to have more bad days than good days. Today for example is a bad day; we just lost 4 miles to Dongfeng in a couple of hours, and we don't really have the answers to it. So frustration goes up, people get frustrated, tired, they're exhausted already, and you've gotta be able to deal with that. And that just comes down to good leadership, good management of the team, and everyone getting back into their positing and their roles, and just doing their job, and not trying to get into each other and getting emotional about it... keep the ups and downs away... Tomorrow we might gain for miles... Just flatline the emotional part of it." Below, Simeon talks about Dongfeng being 4 miles ahead. "And the next guys coming on watch are like, what happened?" On deck, Brad looks tense. "It's not like it's the end of the world. Still a week out." Luke, on the wheel: Talks about being happy the rest of the fleet is tucked away. Nicolai talks about having three not-so-good legs, so the pressure is on. Need to deliver results. "You can never regret putting in 100%, and that's what we're doing right now."Darkness and the sound of flopping sails. On deck at night, Jules is in the foreground, his face illuminated by the light from a tablet. Behind him the railing by the helm is lit by red light. Jules: "The only problem at the moment this way is that no one's actually moving." Nicho: "We can still do our five minutes heading north." Jules: "On starboard." Nicho: "Before running into where MAPFRE is." They discuss that MAPFRE and Dongfeng have stopped. [Guys: I've seen the future. There's a huge windless cloud ahead.] Nicho: "But at least we'll be heading north until we stop." Simeon and Cécile grind on the pedestal. Stars overhead; the main pops over as they tack to starboard. Below, at the nav station, Nicho points out the changed positions on the chart: They've pulled ahead of Dongfeng and MAPFRE, while Vestas further west has made up ground. "Just from one cloud." Another 500, 600 miles of this, he says. Low-altitude drone shot of AkzoNobel drifting on a glassy sea. Martine throws something small down the forward hatch. Crew sits on sails on the bow. Below, Brad says to Nicolai: "Nicolai, you still awake?" Nicolai: "Yeah. Too warm to sleep. Just watching a bit of Netflix." They have a little scripted chitchat. Jules calls down the hatch that they want to do a peel to the J1, and they need some big strong muscle-y men. Shot of the instruments on the mast: Boatspeed: 0.93. High-altitude time-lapse drone shot of AkzoNobel drifting along. Nicho talks about the "good guys" generally doing okay in the doldrums. Nicolai pulls the main. Very-high-altitude drone shot showing them parked. Pretty slomo shot of their branding reflected in the water. Luke, on the helm, talks about the mood: concerned. Need to come out of the doldrums okay so the front bunch gets a jump. Low-altitude drone shot at sunset with another boat beyond them. I think it's probably Vestas.High drone shot showing Dongfeng in the foreground and AkzoNobel in the background. It's a pretty distant shot, and makes me wonder: The OBRs haven't been using this opportunity to get drone closeups of their competitors (which they did, a little, in Leg 2). I bet there was some kind of agreement to limit that, presumably for competitive reasons (i.e., an extension of the "OBR shall not contribute to the racing" concept, such that they shouldn't be potentially helping their crew steal info about setup on the other boats). Anyway, Sam's voice is lapped over the shot: "Nicho, tell me about the art of sailing through the doldrums." We see Nicho, who tells a story about meeting with a meterologist who talked about clouds all day, and he asked him how to tell a good cloud from a bad one. "There is an element of luck... I"m lucky I enjoy it." Luke talks about being stuck in the doldrums, playing cat-and-mouse with Dongfeng. Overlapped with a time-laps of the drone shot of the two boats - which I realize now shows a third boat, Vestas, ahead of them both. Simeon, on the helm, talks about trying to sail from puff to puff. Shot of Dongfeng ahead of them and to leeward. Luke talks about how he thinks Dongfeng is probably tense on board, with their close competitor MAPFRE close by. Shot of a rain cloud. Drone shot from astern as the sun is setting to port with a competitor on the horizon while Brad is hoisted up the mast. Drone shots circling him at the masthead showing rain clouds and the other boats around them. Nicolai talks about them sending Brad up to look for the beeze, having 5 boats in the same area. Simeon, shirtless with the low sun on him, talks about being pretty happy with the situation. "Fighting, you know, every single watch and hour." A shot of them approaching a competitor (I think; unless it's a low-altitude drone shot of their own boat) with the sunset sky behind them. We see the other boat just a few boatlenghts away. Someone says, "There's somebody standing on the prod." [?] Brad (I think) calls out to them: "Who's the monkey on the bowsprit?" We hear the response. Something like, "Go back to Kerikeri, mate", which makes Brad chuckle. [Brad and Blair Tuke are both from Kerikeri, NZ.] I think this must be the super-close approach they had with MAPFRE around 2018.01.10 08:20:10 UTC, so that would make it either Blair or Louis who's answering. Brad, invisible in the dark: "It's nice to talk to somebody from another boat for a change. As much as I love these guys, it's nice to hear a different voice for once. Especially one from Kerikeri." Awesome drone shot passing AkzoNobel at low altitude, flying toward MAPFRE. Lightning-flash illuminated shots of them sailing in the squall that night.Drone shot of AkzoNobel with low sun behind them. In the audio we hear Jules announcing the latest sched, with distances to other boats. Switches to closeups of him talking in the companionway. Below, Brad talks to Nicolai about "Master and Commander". On the foredeck, stacking, Martine slips and falls. She sits in the cockpit and talks about "Master and Commander": "It feels like Master and Commander. We are chasing the French boat." Below, Jules talks about doing 11 gybes in 11 hours. We see the zigzag line on the chart screen. Nicolai, on the pedestal, talks about how they've been chasing Dongfeng, choosing to stick with them. Martine and Simeon talk about it as a battle. Martine: "It is fighting a battle but no guns. Just a lot of trimming the sails." We see a closeup of Cécile's finger (the little finger on her left hand) with a nasty slice as she bandages herself. She explains how she cut it on the handhold when she was thrown off-balance. In the cockpit, Brad, invisible in a balaclava and sunglasses, jokes about wanting to cut it off and cauterize it. "I wanted to do it today but she wouldn't let me." He explains that the pirates used to do it all the time. References Master and Commander again. Nicolai talks about Dongfeng and trying to learn from their moding (whether they sail high or low) and the sail combinations and setup. We see Dongfeng in the distance. Closeup of Cécile's hand with the bandaged finger as she trims. Great drone shot of AkzoNobel sailing fast, triple-heading with the A3.Drone shot AT NIGHT of AkzoNobel silhouetted against the trail of the nearly full moon on the water behind them. Masthead red running light is visible, also four different white lights. Not sure what's up with those. Sail-illumination lights? Brad, on deck: "Beautiful night out here." Talks about chipping away at Dongfeng, who crossed them by 2.5 miles, and are now 5 miles away. Gybe coming up; hope to make more gains there. Simeon, at nav station below, nods to Sam. Simeon: "Yeah. Pretty happy." Luke, on deck on the wheel (I think): "Warm water. Full moon. Doesn't get any better... Great company. Go the A-team on here." Shot of Orion standing on his head next to the shrouds. Shot of the helmsman from the cockpit, then pans up the backstay to show the Southern Cross. Drone shot close to the boat from to leeward, illuminated by moonlight.Jules, at the nav station, talks to Sam. "How would I describe myself? Tired?... I think I'm pretty easy-going, most of the time, except when I'm tired." Sam: "How do you think the crew would describe you?" Jules: "Miserable. Quiet." On deck, Luke answers the question: "Uncomplicated, I would say. [laughs] No; he's a good rooster. Very rarely gets it wrong. It's only us getting it wrong that makes him look bad." Looks like this was shot as they were beating out of Port Phillip Bay on the first afternoon. Closeup of Jules at the nav station, rubbing his head. Shot of the computer showing weather. On deck, Brad points out Green Cape. "Everyone knows it's one of the most southeastern capes of Australia." Shot of the cape with its lighthouse. To the left is another boat, barely visible; I'm guessing it's Vestas. On deck, Simeon talks about needing to choose whether to play the coast or go offshore. Shot from the cabin of Jules (below) talking to Nicho (on deck). Simeon crouches down as water splashes over him. Simeon: "[something] stay in touch with the other guys. Otherwise you'll lose them." Jules discusses how the fleet is splitting. Also there are three different tidal models that disagree as to where the eddy is. More discussion by Simeon: gybe or not? Conversation with the three of them continues below at the nav station. Nicho: "If you gybe back, you're pretty much committed to playing the shore." Sam talks to Jules: "How would you describe the decision-making process on this boat?" Jules: "Not very clear. Because not everyone knows the full implications of everything they're talking about. You often get into situations like this where it's a tossup, you gotta trust one weather model or the other. Or you just do the conservative thing and stay with the fleet." Nicho, below, eating: "You've gotta kick it around. Kick it to death. And then make a gut call, usually. There's a fair bit of science involved... I think in the end for this situation, we're on a good heading with great pressure. More breeze than inshore." Sam: "How would you describe the decision-making process on this boat?" Nicho: "Plenty of input from everybody. At times this is Simeon's boat. I certainly from my side I feel like I can make the decision and live with it perhaps a bit easier. It's not a difficulty, it's just how it is. I guess we've kind of struggled and grappled with that sitaution a little. But no; the actual process I think is quite good. No one's angry or frustrated or anyting like that. It's just trying to weigh up all the pros and cons, come up with a decision."AkzoNobel is sailing upwind inside Port Phillip Bay on starboard. Nicho, on the stern, talks about how they couldn't hold their lane on port tack after the start. "Don't know. Not sure what happened. We were slow on port for a long time." Shot of their stern with a Bravo (protest) flag flying; other boats in the distance. Simeon below: "Yeah, we had a bit of a speed issue, yeah." Shots of crew moving the stack. Nicho: "It's not where you want to be... back of the pack... No use grumbling about it." Below, Nicolai and Simeon are looking through the window in the hull, talking about the prop. Maybe it wasn't folding properly? Brad looks through an inspection tool: "It's closed but it's got weed in it... Looks like I'm going over the side. Get a lot of heel on, and rip it off." Sam: "Would this explain the speed?" Brad: "Hopefully." On deck, Brad gets lowered over the weather side in his foulies with lines forward and aft; he goes down near the waterline to inspect. Cécile's back is in the foreground as she relays Brad's words, then helps him back on deck. Brad: "A bit of weed. Not as big as it looked. But it's closed. Nothing underwater slowing us down. So get into it." Later, on the stern, Sam asks Brad: "How's it feel to be in last place coming out of Australia?" Brad: "I hate to say, but we're used to it." Luke: "New Year's resolution? Probably just to win a few legs here." Martine: "I dunno. Just keep positive." Brad: "Not be last out of the next start. And start getting in front of the fleet." Rainbow in the boat's spray to leeward. Luke talks about the frustration of starting off in last or close to last. "People say you're unlucky, but you create your own luck." Talks about teamwork, they're a great group of sailors. Real rainbow to leeward; a competitor below and behind them. Simeon talks about them doing well in the last sched. "Zero to hero." First in the position reports. At the nav station, Jules talks about their performance. Sam: "How'd you manage to check back in with the fleet?" Jules: "Bit of luck, really. Guys have been sailing pretty hard all night. Everyone's been up pretty much most of the night. Gybed on a couple of shifts. Got a nice header for a while..." Talks about disappointment at the start, needing to hang in there. "If we go fast we'll be all right." Rainbow with Vestas, Dongfeng to leeward.Crew in cockpit. Nav station below, with instrument readout. Jules explains that they're appraoching the finish area. Talks about the high pressure they have to go through to get to the finish. So they're a few days out from Melbourne still. Simeon putting on (off?) his gear. Talks about pleasant conditions. "Everyone's looking forward to finishing the leg and move on." Frustration. Shot of Nicolai eating. Jules looking glum at nav station; he gets up and leaves.Slomo shots of the crew working in the cockpit. Washing machine. Nicho comes below, takes his gear off, washes his face in the galley. Nicho: "You see when you take certain medication, 'Don't operate this vehicle when tired and drowsy'? Well, everyone's operating this vehicle tired and drowsy." Talks about getting rest, food, makes for better decisions. Martine comes below, takes off her gear. "For me sleep and food go side by side. The less I sleep the more I have to eat to have energy." Martine eats. Nicolai talks below about the balance between sleeping and eating. Brad: People sacrifice a lot to get a couple of minutes extra sleep. People don't brush their teeth to get a couple more minutes of sleep. Don't want to name names." Martine gets in her bunk. Nico, talks about the upcoming stronger conditions. "Plenty of sleep. Just look at me." He grins.Slomo through wheel of the ocean. Slomo water in cockpit, Martine's corn rows. Below, Martine talks about how the double points in the leg are going to really hurt them. "It's a bit disappointing. But it's still a long race to go so the chances are still there." Simeon: "We're up to speed, but yeah, a long way behind the pack. We're doing good polars... fingers crossed there are still some opportunities." Nicho: Talks below about the same thing (double points, finishing at the back)... "One maneuver gone wrong, and before that we were competing nicely. People gotta... draw faith that we can do it. We can match up with these guys. Frustrating part now is we've gotta wait for our next opportunity. We probably won't get another opportunity on this leg. Sadly I think we're done. It's not gonna stop us trying." Simeon: "It makes you realize that one bad gybe can cost you a lot in one day... Yeah, it's a setback, but the race's not over." Martine, chewing and staring into space: "Well. You gotta have the bad ones to realize the good ones. Yeah."Somone (Brad?) works on the masttrack up the mast. Simeon says it's the second attempt, with different glue. "Not a specified curing time like the books. But we hope it's strong enough." Going to hoist the main again, and put a strap around where the batten car is and hpe for the best. Everyone looks at the sail with expressions of concern. Nicho: "It'll work". With the main up they sail faster. Everyone looking up. Nicolai on the stern talks about how they knew after the first one it wouldn't be a good repair, but they knew after this one it would be a good one. "It's holding." Below, Nicho is getting his foulies off. "Been sailing two or three hours, and no problems, so... Hopefully now we can be 100% to Melbourne, catch some miles up." In the background Martine gets her foulies off. Nicho talks about how there could be a weather pattern that would pull the boats together. "We're a long way behind, but no one's giving up." Talks about needing to make the next start, and get the boat fully prepared and operational.Pretty clouds. Crew shifting the stack as AkzoNobel sails downwind with the main lowered. Nicho explains that they've just finished stackign in preparation for hoisting the main. Talks about the repair; difficulty of getting a glue cure in the cold conditions. Maybe having a chance to catch some boats. Main goes up slowly. Nico, on the stern: "Tracks popped straight off. So obviously it couldn't hold in the conditions... Hopefully we'll get it down now, and... try it again. Still 3,000 miles to go." (Side note: It sure seems like Nicho has basically taken over the boat. Is Simeon even in command at this point?) Lowering the main. Martine gets washed off the cabin top by a wave; catches herself. They struggle to lower the main. Jules talks about the fleet being gone, not wanting to get down south and have to beat back, which they can't do. Nicho responds: "Well, we can step it down later in the day. Get a plan for this track. Even if the fleet's gone, get to Melbourne on time... for the next start." Below, Brad takes off his foulies. Looks very discouraged. "Pretty frustrating working two or three days to get it done, it pops off so quickly afterwards." Talks about trying to jury something else up, hope that that works. Slomo albatross. Below, working on the track repair, Nicolai watches Simeon eats in the background. "We've got five tubes of glue left, which means after this we've got one more. So this better work." More repair attempts on the mast. Emily watches from the stern. Nicolai, below, explains that the glue needs 6 to 8 hours to cure. Going to sail some more, and then try to hoist again before sunset.Nicolai, on deck in his neoprene cowl in fairly light air, talks about how they're the most southern boat right now, and have just gybed. Fleet split into two groups; they're wth MAPFRE and Dongfeng. Below, Martine (in cornrows) bails out water. Jules and Nicho, at the nav station, look at routing software. Jules talks about being a bit disappointed in the latest sched, vs. MAPFRE and Dongfeng, Brunel. Nicho: "We coughed it up there last night." Separately, Nicho talks about how each of the boats separated; probably due to breeze. Shot of Simeon on the helm, scowling in his cold-weather cowl. Álex, in the cockpit, talks about how we are here, in the Southern Ocean, but it isn't normal conditions. "Like a pit stop before the next depression comes, with 35, 40 knots, straight to Melbourne." Nicolai talks about how variable the Southern Ocean is. "It's like a spring day in Denmark up north. So I'm enjoying it."Shooting through the cockpit railing under gray skies, we see a bunch of competitors on AzkoNobel's weather quarter. Left to right I think they might be Brunel, Dongfeng, MAPFRE, and more distant maybe Vestas? Then we see a shot of Simeon working on the pit winch with Scallywag ahead of and to leeward of them. Simeon looks up at the slot to check sailtrim. He talks to James about not doing too well at the start: "We need to practice those ones." Talks about being close to the fleet, the wind being up/down/left/right. Justin, on the helm, talks about wind pressure. We see Scallywag, on starboard under the MH0, crossing them while Brad goes to go out on the bowsprit. Nicho, in the cockpit, talks about the contrast during the night of being in almost 40 knots, then getting flat sees and "almost nice sailing again." He talks about the 40 knot conditions being uncomfortable; slamming and worrying about breakage. Martine talks about getting stuck in a hole and passed. Nicolai talks about the first 24 hours being pretty good, intense, hunting and almost back where they want to be. Nicho talks about getting to the new wind and tacking, and then waiting for the front to get there. We see the feet of someone on the helm putting on their boots.Simeon walks along the side of the boat, shaking hands with shore crew standing on the dock. Motoring out, Brad talks about how funny it is to be talking to lots of people on Facebook, on shore, and then leaving and realizing it's just the 10 of you for the next few weeks." Nicho, standing on the stern, talks about leaving. "Not nervous. But quite motivated, to take this thing on. This is a big leg, a double-point leg... It's a high-wind, high-risk, high-speed leg." The start; other boats. Scallywag dives below them from astern. Footage of them going very slowly in light wind. Someone (Nicho?) talks about getting the FR0 stowed. Nicolai on the helm as they sail fast on port tack. Nicho talks about them getting stuck in a light patch and the boats inshore getting away from them. "Long, long way to go yet." Slomo grinding.Tight slomo closeups of Simeon's face, hands as he steers. On the rail, Simeon talks about pushing for 5th place as the only realistic option. Talks about TTToP and Scallywag. Shot on their weather quarter of both of the other two boats, with TTToP on the right and Scallywag on the left. Below, in his bunk, Brad untangles earbud cords. Brad: "You never start a race wanting to come last, or even second to last. Pretty painful to know that the race is over for the rest of the guys, more or less, and still have a day to go, at least." Nicolai, below: "If you finish last you basically could have delivered the boat. So you put in a lot of work, a lot of effort, just to come in [he shrugs] last... Coming 5th is not the result we want, but you can accept it." Simeon talks about the team having pushed and done a good job, and the points being important, and it being a long race. "Let's enjoy the last little bit of good racing."Drone shot pans up to show AkzoNobel sailing toward the drone. In the cockpit, Martine trims the main. On the helm, Nicho talks about how they've fallen off the front and winds are lighter [hence the drone footage], and it's hurting them in the previous sched and likely the next one. Luke talks about how they're now last on the leaderboard. "Pretty frustrating. Haven't had the best luck with the weather, unfortunately... but also haven't been sailing the boat as well as we possiby can. So we have a lot of work to do in Cape Town." Jules at the nav station looks concerned. Nicolai aggressively brushes his teeth. Simeon, below, talks about the disappointment: "It's always hard to swallow when you see every sched, moving back." Low-altitude drone shot from the port quarter. Peter, grinding: "We're pushing as hard as possible, trying to catch every wave. But we've been losing for a few days." Nicho, on the helm; Simeon, below, talk about needing to stay focused and keep pushing despite the disappointment. Luke, on the stern pedestal: "Sometimes you get the elevator; sometimes you get the shaft." Drone shot.Slomo shot of a dark albatross gliding in their wake. Emily, below, getting out of her bunk: "It's cold." Jules, at the nav station, talks about how they're still riding the front, but have high pressure a few days ahead. Simeon repairs some piece of gear, hands it to someone, and talks about the upcoming winds and strategy. "In general we've been sailing the boat well." Nicho, on the stern: "Number one challenge is how we're gonna get ahead of some of the boats ahead of us." Talks about how boats can get stuck in the approach to Cape Town. Slomo of spray coming into the cockpit.Nicho, on deck as AkzoNobel sails on starboard gybe in 10 knots of wind: "The last sched dropped us from first to fifth... The game is to set ourselves up for the next front." Simeon talks about the next 24-48 hours, and how they've stacked the sails smaller so they can get them further astern. Emily: "I'm expecting it to get a lot windier and a lot colder. So I've got two sets of thermals I've been saving up for the whole trip." Brad, below, says he's been saving thermals. Nicolai, below, also says he's been saving up a new set of thermals he'll be pulling out. Shot up the slot at AkzoNobel triple-heading on starboard.Nicho: Talks below about the competition. "We're kind of still paying the price for mistakes we made several days ago." Continues a pattern of him focusing on the earlier "miscommunication" as a source of their problem. In the background, Martine uses and empties the head. Luke: "For the good of everyone on board you try to stay as level-headed as possible. But it's obviously hard not to get caught up in the emotion of winning and losing... But there are times when you've had a couple of hard watches like we've ahd in the last couple of days where it's pretty hard to keep your emotions in check. But that's sport, isn't it?" Nicho on the helm. Brad, below, shirtless: "I try to keep it even. As much as some guys back there [looks aft] try to wind you up or make your life hard, I just try to get on with it and get the job done. Does take a bit of a toll." Simeon, at the nav station, talks about learning from his former skipper on ABN AMRO 2 to keep emotions at an average level, not too high or low. Nicho, below, talks about hoping for an opportunity later. Sunrise.AkzoNObel reaches on port gybe with a reefed main. Simeon sits on the weather rail; Emily sits forward of him on the mainsheet. Simeon talks about having a rough night, having been stuck under a cloud and lost a bit. Slomo of bow. Shot of them racing in a rain squall. Nicolai talks about two kinds of clouds: a "sucking" cloud or a "dropping" cloud. "Dropping clouds are the good ones, they come with rain but they also come with winds. The sucking clouds are the bad ones; they just take the breeze and you park up." Shots from inside the cabin as rain pours down on the cockpit. Below, Jules talks about the squall; it was their first big one, 33-35 knots. They saw it on the radar but were late reducing sail and so "got a bit low in it". Jules: "I just got washed back by a wave as I was trying to go forward, got knocked back on my backside, which was a little embarrassing." Shot of Jules being washed off his feet in the cockpit by a wave. Jules talks about seeing the size if the cloud after coming out of it. Slomo shot of water pouring in the cockpit. Martine, soaking wet below, talks about not being able to find her shoes, but it being a good opportunity for a shower, then she resumes looking for fresh clothes.Drone shot of AkzoNobel sailing in about 12 knots of wind, triple-heading with the Masthead 0 on port gybe. Simeon, on the mainsheet, talks about Dongfeng being visible on the horizon, talks about the bungee effect as the squalls cause big changes in the wind. Another drone shot. Jules, on the stern, talks about the wind variations and the confused seas making the boat "like a submarine. So that's a bit hard." Luke on the helm talks about trying to avoid nose-diving. Stern cam shot of washing machine. Brad talks about being on the mainsheet for three hours, shows his hands. "Good for your exfoliating." Jules talks about the wind; 23 knots at the moment, softening later. Drone shot.Emily, below, pours from the kettle into a food bag. Emily: "I think probably the hardest thing to get used to on this boat is always being wet." Shot on deck of spray coming over the bow. Luke, on deck at the stern getting doused: "It's just challenging at the moment becuase you're constantly wet." He talks about stuffing people's wet things into an empty food bag to get it out of the way. Luke: "I see there's a bit of a rabbits nest of wet clothing gathering below... People will be asking where their wet stuff is, pretty soon, looking to dry it out. I think it's pretty much gone for the race." Emily: "A tiny bit of water down your neck seal, and all your thermals are wet... I'm still wearing the same wet thermals that I put on when I left the dock a couple of days ago." Emily and Simeon eating below. Simeon says something to her about chocolate, jokes about losing his credibility (?). Simeon: "I always find the first 24 hours tough. Then you get used to you're always damp. You smell like a web Labrador that just jumped in the mud. But when everything is like that, evertying becomes simple as well... You appreciate your warm meal out of a plastic bag. Whole group... [gestures at Emily] Good company." Camera pans to Emily, who keeps eating without looking up or acknowleding the remark.Simeon on the dock before the race with a little girl (presumably his daughter), then side-hugging and kissing a woman (presumably his wife). Simeon, below on AkzoNobel (before the start?). Simeon: "Of course you know it's not that sudden change; you've been plannnig for it all along. But still, it's hard. Twenty-one days, more, twenty-two days, without a call. It's a bit old-school. These days everyone is in contact all around the world 24/7... On the other hand, it's a real comfortable feeling. They're in a good place and they take care of each other. So when everything is good at home it's easy for us to leave." Slomo shot of Luke holding a young child on the dock. Below, as AkzoNobel is bashing under sail, Luke: "It's a bit differnt, you know, family life and then coming into the storm, so to speak. It's great sailing conditions, it's just unfortunate that we've had a tear to our J1. But we'll get it fixed in a few days time when we need it and be back to full power." On deck, looking forward as AkzoNobel surfs toward the sunset, Nico steers. Nicolai gets spray in the face from the washing machine.As AkzoNobel sails upwind on starboard, Simeon talks to the crew about what's happened in the fleet around them. Nicolai is on the helm; Emily looks at a tablet. Simeon: "Scallywag was hanging on, but they fell off, so they're 10 miles behind now... Light is on top, and pressure is there [gesturing to leeward]. Vestas is trying to defend. But actually MAPFRE went up higher... Options are still open."Ross talks to Simeon at the nav station. They're pointing out different boats. Simeon to Konrad: "MAPFRE slipped away underneath us. We thought we were doing the righ thting, but it must have gone still on the inside, and the rich got richer basically. Hopefully it will happen the same to us. We still have a little to go to the waypoint. But hopefully we'll make a gap with the rest of the fleet, and go for the hunt." Simeon rubs his face and forehead in apparent discouragement.Shot of AkzoNobel slatting in no wind. Simeon: "We had a little bit of an accident yesterday with one of the mainsail battens; the top batten." Shot of them lowering the main, removing batten cars from the mast track. We see the crew repairing the broken battan, as Luke talks off-camera: "There's so many pieces that go together to making a mainsail, that you break one bit it's all related to the others. Unfortuantely we broke this top batten, which is the main batten that sets up the whole square top of the sail. So with a couple of days of reaching ahead of us, we thought we'd take this light air moment to repair it. Boys have done a good job, and now we're ready to hoist." Shots of them re-hoisting the main.Night. Talking in the cockpit as they've furled the Fractional 0. Discussion of rudders. A crewmember (Nicolai, maybe?) probes with a boat hook off the stern, then straightens up. Crewmember: "Gone." Other voice: "Gone?" First crewmember: "Gone." Simeon below, at the nav station: "We're here off the African coast, and we hit something pretty hard. Twenty-two, twenty-three knots. Some plastic on the rudder, vibration on the keel. We furled the fractional and did a bit of a back down. Seems to be gone." He shrugs. "No water in the boat. Rudders still in." He gives a "let's go" gesture and smiles.Ross, with a tablet, navigates in the cockpit. Simeon steers. Ross: "We're setting up for Gibraltar, we're just on the starboard side of the channel in the anchorage where the ships are, literally just east of Gibraltar. And we're gonna gybe and get lined up for the shipping lanes... One of the busiest places in the world for shipping, and we've got to follow all the rules and regulations, and at the same time yacht this thing through as fast as we can. So yeah; it's gonna be a busy 6 to 8 hours." Nicolai takes the helm from Simeon.Sunrise shot of silhouetted crew (Martine?) on the helm. Simeon at nav station, talking about their strategic moves. "It came out well. We're in second position, behind Vestas. But it's still close racing."