Bruce’s R2AK Update and Tactical Outlook – 28 June

Mad Dog continues to dominate the fleet while the battle for steak knives sharpens. Mad Dog is roughly 70 miles from the next Check Point at Bella Bella and holds about a 60 mile lead on the Jungle kitty and Madrona while another pickle fork (Brodema) continues to slowly gain on the two monohuills.

It will be slow going this morning as we look at the big picture and when you compare today’s map with tomorrows you’ll see a very interesting shift in how the NWS is viewing that front and low pressure system we mentioned yesterday. The stationary 1014 MB in today’s map shows a front that is breaking apart as it approaches the coast. The Wednesday morning chart shows a an intact warm front over the Queen Charlotte Islands with a cold front coming in right behind it. 12 hours later it’s all gone, with a new low having formed in the same place offshore where the 1014 Mb low was this morning. The reason for this is in the upper atmosphere (500MB) charts. Those pesky upper level lows are now isolated above the jet stream and with not much to push them around they will just continue to form new surface lows with associated frontal systems. All relatively weak but as you can see, strong enough to break up that weak high pressure system that was over SE Alaska.

While it may be slow going this morning with the light air out of the NNW, by late afternoon and into the early evening the wind will back around to NW. After about 2200 hours the wind right next to the BC coast will once again drop into the 0 to 4 knot range and stay in the 6-10 knot range from the NW south of Calvert Island.

For the Mad Dogs it will mean a slow approach into the CP at Bella Bella however by 0400 what wind there is will start to back around to the W. By about 1300 it will be up to about 6-8 knots from SW and the MD’s should once again be launched and headed towards to finish. There will some light spots as they get to Dixon Entrance which will allow the pursing pack of jackals to close a bit however as I said earlier, it will take a collision with something big or a major gear failure to keep them from finishing first and breaking the existing course record.

Bruce Hedrick

Bruce has raced and cruised the Pacific Northwest his entire life. He earned a Bachelor’s of Science from the University of Washington in Biological Oceanography and learned meteorology “to keep from getting kicked around on the race course.” Bruce spent nearly two decades as Associate Publisher for Northwest Yachting Magazine, retiring in mid-2015, and was the chairman of the board of trustees for the Northwest Marine Trade Association in 2014. (photo of Bruce driving Playstation is a bit dated, but cool)