Morning Light Page #6

who are telling you

what to do all the time,

but you all kind of feel

like you're part of it

and feel like we have a shot

at doing really well in this race.

Piet and Jeremy and I, we're at a very

big decision-making point right now,

we need to choose between

the northern and southern route.

There's no middle-of-the-road route.

'Cause we have a local

weak high-pressure

that has been living in the middle of

the wing existing tracks for Transpac.

The history of the race

has always been the team

that makes that choice

at the right time,

whether it's to go south, to go north.

It's a defining moment, and it's

one of those moments you back up,

and that's where

the race is won and lost.

What I'm saying is,

you know, if we're...

If we're gonna be in the synoptic,

we're on the southern route...

[Sanderson] They really gotta make sure

that they stay in the pack,

don't make some dumb mistake

which suddenly drops them

a few miles behind,

and then they're on the back foot.

They don't need to be leading,

they just need to be in the hunt.

Everything we've always learned and

talked about is not to get that close.

Jeremy, what do you think?

South.

We just wanna stay away

from this, uh, high.

[Van Os] Big fish last night

jumped out of the water,

- hit the sail right there.

- [Tulloch] Hit the sail, I know.

What about that whale?

That was a whale, wasn't it?

[Van Os] I thought so.

[Tulloch] Ten feet from our boat.

Trim on.

Trim? Trim?

Trim.

[Van Os] You gotta use

your big girl voice.

[Tulloch] Hold there.

[Towill] It's the first morning,

the sun just came up.

At sunset last night

we could see ten, 15 boats,

and now we've got no one in sight.

Position report comes out

in a little while,

we'll see how we're doing

against our competitors.

[Branning] Alaska Eagle, Alaska Eagle,

this is Morning Light Whiskey Delta

Delta five one seven eight.

[man] Morning Light, have you loud

and clear. Welcome and good morning.

Your position.

Thirty-two one-nine north.

One-one-nine five-six west.

[man] Morning Light,

thank you very much.

[Wilmot] Where are they?

[Branning] Samba Pa Ti's

range and bearing.

Range:
20 miles.

Bearing:
223.

[Wilmot] So they're going up.

[Branning] Directly ahead of us,

20 miles. Yeah.

- They're 19 miles ahead.

- Yeah.

[Wilmot groans]

[Branning] We need to know who's goin'

north and who's goin' south.

You see what's for dinner?

Eleven forty-one on Monday,

and, uh, that means lunchtime.

So, the first gourmet meal

of this big event

will be, uh,

beef stroganoff with noodles.

My favorite.

[Branning] This southerly route

doesn't look so good. It's nine knots.

I wanna go fast.

That's 20 knots up there right now.

- [Wilmot] What, going north?

- [Branning] Going more northerly, yeah.

It's like taking

a right turn right now.

It's all in or nothing, man.

Figure I could just ask right now.

I mean, it's been an hour

since we've been...

Started this discussion,

you know.

We haven't heard from them

what we should be doing.

[indistinct]

I think I should just start smashing

my foot on the deck.

- That's not... Uh, yeah.

- No, they hate that.

Yeah.

- [Wilmot] What do you guys think?

- [Branning] If we do this,

this is the whole race right here.

[Kane] Here we go, guys.

Let's go!

Are we basically deciding

to go north now, or...

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

What's the heading? 245?

Hey, lads!

We're going north.

- Ease the sheets!

- Full upwind.

North. Full upwind.

[Van Os] This is a slow way

to go across the Pacific, huh?

[Kane] Are we going to Alaska?

About 12 hours later,

the kids changed their mind

and they headed north again.

What it told me was that, you know,

there was somebody home on the boat.

They were thinking, they were making

decisions, they were doing stuff.

Then they headed north again.

[Enright] You know what I just thought

of, but I don't know why?

You know why the Chevy Nova

didn't work in Mexico?

[Towill] Yeah. All right.

[Enright] 'Cause "no va"

means, like, "no go."

Why'd you buy a car

called the "no go"?

[laughter]

[Tulloch] Freakin' dying. Quickly.

[music slowing down]

[Schubert] No way.

This wind's just gonna die.

[Enright] "Graham,

the race has been slow.

I'm sure you're aware of this.

The brain trust has just indicated

that the next 18 hours or so

may dictate the entire

outcome of the race.

I hope your fingers are crossed

and you're following along at home

in Hawaii or wherever you are

at this present point in time.

My feet are just starting to smell.

I'm using precious off-watch time

to communicate with you.

I guess that's all for now.

Adios from the nerve center.

Talk to you later."

[Kane] This is bad.

Real bad.

[Wilmot] You think this is the first

time this has happened in the Transpac?

It'll be one that

they're gonna remember,

- and Stan's gonna harken back to.

- Yeah, this is crazy.

Any way you approach this race,

you have to slice through that.

[Van Os] That turn's gonna cost us.

[Branning] No use talking about it now.

[# Zero 7:
In The Waiting Line]

Oh, this is painful

circumstances right now.

We've got our opponents

out to the south of us

who are screaming along with a kite.

Guys out to the north

of us are in more breeze.

This is frustrating.

We took a gamble.

[groans] It was a big move at the time.

Now we're fighting for the past two days

to get out of it.

And we should've pretended

we were on train tracks

and just trusted it.

Didn't look this light.

But it is, and here we are.

Can't escape it now.

- [Branning] We should've known better.

- Yeah.

We can second-guess

ourselves all the way home.

We'll be lucky to make it

to Hawaii in ten days, now.

[Welch] I got a question for ya.

- [Kane] Yeah?

- [Welch] Are we effed?

- [Kane] Huh?

- [Welch] Are we effed?

- [Kane] We don't think so. Yeah.

- [Welch] Really?

You think... you think

that we can reel in Samba?

[Kane] Uh, we'll see.

[Welch] We're not, like,

out in the middle of nowhere?

- [Kane] No, we're not.

- [Welch] You sure?

[Wilmot] Big wind shift

here, guys.

[Branning] Come on.

Let's do this.

[Kane] OK, tacking the boat.

Going to Hawaii.

[Schubert] Finally!

[Wilmot] We're almost

pointing at the mark.

[Tulloch] Guys, when you have dinner,

clean your stuff, please.

- Oh! Oh-ho!

- Whoo! [laughs]

[Branning] It's Wednesday morning.

Uh, just got done doin' the roll call.

Not to be, like, uh, Debbie Downer,

I thought we were gonna be smoked

after yesterday.

[Welch] Did you hear from Branning,

the position report?

- Brought some standings.

- Eh.

We're first in division, 21 st in fleet.

And Samba's, uh, second in division,

22nd in fleet.

We have 1,742 miles to go,

and they got 1,742 miles to go.

[Schubert] Did anybody see that comin'?

[Kane] Branning, you the man.

Hi.

Hi.

Twelve hours ago we were all wrecked.

Branning was ready to quit

sailing altogether.

Very stressful.

Think I lost some hair.

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