Glasgow continues to reduce JAMAICA's lead

The chasing pack is closing in on JAMAICA.

For more than a week now we have been ploughing a lonely furrow ahead of the fleet. We are still in the lead - and by some considerable margin - but our competitors are nipping at our heels.

At 06:00 this morning our lead over Glasgow was down to 31 miles. However, as the graphic above shows we are sailing through some very congested waters at the moment as we pass North of the Philippines and South of Taiwan. Up ahead there are is an army of more than 1o major islands protecting the entrance to the Eastern China Sea and which are making the choice of tactics difficult; which gap should they go through before they turn to the North for the last dash to Qingdao?

The high seas are making conditions on board challenging and the colder weather is setting in with the first appearance of the oilies overnight. This has been a very hard leg with the boats sailing into the wind right from leaving the Keppel Marina at Singapore. The first boats were estimated by the Race organisers to arrive in Qingdao around 14th February. Here at jamaicaclipper.com we feel the likely date of arrival is more like 16th February. If that is the case it shows what a tought race this has been ....

... and proves all the more what a fantastic transformation skipper Simon Bradley and his team have made to be leading this race from the very early days.