The harsh northwest to north wind that dominated the past three days of the Rolex Fastnet Race 2017 has softened its cough through Thursday. It’s settling in to be an Atlantic sou’west to west airflow, which eventually will bring rain over Ireland, but just for once there’s a chance it won’t rain in Plymouth writes W M Nixon.

That would be one for the books, as most of us recall the post-Fastnet celebrations as invariably involving the occasional deluge, but maybe climate change is for real. Whatever, the task of unravelling 312 IRC-rated results and getting everything set up for Friday night’s prize-giving is as hectic as ever. But at least the main man, RORC Commodore Michael Boyd, was comfortably finished well in time this morning (Thursday) in command of the First 44.7 Lisa, and he’ll have had a good night’s sleep before festivities begin tomorrow evening’s fiesta. During it, for the sake of ID, he is obliged to wear an old-fashioned white-topped yachting cap. You need to be well-rested and in the full of your health to do that with style and assurance. 

As to the racing, he has put himself in place for the Gull Salver for the best-placed Irish boat by being an impressive 8th overall and second in Class 2 to Pintia after sailing a very neat race. Lisa had logged just 669 miles for a 605 mile course, in which some other boats thought there was an awful lot of slugging to windward, with many tacks and many more miles to be sailed. But Lisa, and others whose performance we hope to be examining in more detail in Saturday’s blog, managed to shimmy round with very few extra miles sailed - her skipper gives his impressions of the boat and the race here:

Few did the minimal miles more emphatically than the Phantom Boat, which really did come out of nowhere to win overall. The French JND 39 Lann Ael 2 (Didier Gaudoux) didn’t show up at all on the entry list attached to the Tracker Chart. And her position was never indicated on the Tracker Chart itself either. Yet suddenly on Wednesday, she rose without trace on the leaderboard, shown as having the potential to snatch the veteran Cookson 50 Privateer’s overall win at the last moment.

And that, in the small hours of this morning, is precisely what she did. The Phantom Boat sailed only 662 miles to get round the course whereas Privateer – which will surely hang onto her second place overall – sailed 687 miles. But Lann Ael 2 came out of the darkness off Plymouth at just after two o’clock this morning, and bested Privateer by a pretty convincing 42 minutes. Yet where she did it and how she did it, heaven only knows. She has been and gone without leaving so much as a shadow. However, tomorrow night her crew will wrap themselves round the very real Fastnet Trophy, so who cares whether they cast a shadow or not?

Is she leaving a shadow here? Lann Ael 2 in smoother conditions in the Solent.

Certainly not the Irish or Irish-connected boats in or near the finish as we sign this off at 2030 hours Thursday. When this great race started, we were interested particularly in the two sailing school boats, the Irish National Sailing School’s J/109 Jedi, and Irish Offshore Sailing’s Sunfast 37 Desert Star, which won the Sailing School Trophy in 2015’s race.

Well, the Kenneth Rumball-skippered Jedi has had the best of it, finhshing tonght at 2100 hrs.. In fact, she’s done well every which way, as she also beat the Welsh/Irish J/109 Mojito (Peter Dunlop & Vicky Cox), although for the final hundred miles it was as though Jedi, Mojito and the classic S & S 41 Winsome, helmed by Laura Dillon, were glued together, so closely did they hold their relative positions.

Tracker here

But just who wins the Roger Justice Trophy for the best sailing school result won’t be known just yet, as the information as to which crew qualified as a sailing school appears to be kept under wraps. All will be revealed by tomorrow evening.

The Irish National Sailing School’s 29–year–old Kenneth Rumball–skippered J/109 Jedi has done best of the Irish sailing schools in the Fastnet Race, and has also managed to beat Mojito, one of the hottest J/109s in the Irish Sea.