My personal highlight of the race so far was the other morning; big rolling seas, overcast sky, freezing water, 40 knots of breeze, A6 (fractional spinnaker) and 2 reefs, fully stacked aft, Mikey on the pumps Jez trimming, me on the wheel.

We were just blasting along with prolonged periods pf over 30 knots boat speed and a max speed of 34 knots. However this was then followed by near disaster as soon after the watch change, Mikey and I were in the bow bailing out when we heard the boat take off, down what must have been a huge wave, as we hit the bottom, with nowhere to go, the boat had to either roll into the breeze and broach or Chinese gybe (an accidental gybe).

Unfortunately the helmsman was powerless to control her and we ‘chinesed.’ There was carnage on deck and down below. Sail stack in the water, keel on the wrong side, crew clipped on half underwater, runners on the wrong side, boom in the air, spinnaker in the rig, boat half under water, kit everywhere down below as various missiles launched themselves at the off watch.

After what seemed like an eternity we sorted the keel out, completed the gybe, got the kite down and gybed back to our proper course, all very relieved still to have a rig in the boat!!

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Report from Nick Bubb, Watch Leader on Kosatka, Team Russia