Myself, David Schofield, Steve Graham and Wayne Huntley jumped back aboard in Southampton around 1pm, plotted the waypoints, filled with fuel and started out on a mammoth catch-up with the Rally; the remainder of the other boats were travelling south from Newcastle to Ipswich, we were to run along the south coast passing Portsmouth, Brighton, Eastbourne, Dover, Ramsgate across the Thames Estuary, past Colchester and eventually into Levington Marina by Ipswich. We covered around 195 nautical miles arriving at 7pm; we averaged 32.5knots per hour for the trip, which was quite a result! The boat performed quite superbly, handled beautifully and made a very long trip most pleasurable and memorable.

All the other crews cheered us in to the Marina, after which significant Guinness was drunk after a fantastic trip back in.

The next morning…… everyone in the Marina for fuelling from 7am, we, as the only unleaded RIB, went to the unleaded pump and managed to squeeze 521lt in, paying a ridiculous £1.86/lt. Turned the engines back on, to the sound of four alarms all saying turn off – critical error, water in fuel! To keep this part of the story (growing unbelievable nightmare) brief it took 13 hours of arguing with the marina that they had contaminated fuel, getting a pumping company to drain our tanks of all 750lt (£1,400 worth of fuel at their prices), then have the marina go to local petrol stations with 20lt Jerry cans that we manually poured back in (38 cans in total). We washed the fuel off us as best we could, got kitted up quickly and agreed the best option of standing any chance of catching up with everyone else, who were already enjoying Brighton Marina was to cast off and head south; considering the volume of ferries and container ships it was slightly fool hardy, but…. at 9:20pm we thankfully left!

Dodging wakes of unseen ships, following distant lights, passing a whale and numerous seals, and for the last hour and a half in total darkness apart from a partly cloud covered moon we radioed into Ramsgate Harbour; we had covered the 60 nautical miles in 2 hours, averaging 30 knots/hour, which again was great considering half was in darkness. Interesting placing faith just in a 10″ screen and a compass bearing, trying to maintain 30 knots, barely managing to see wave patterns any further than 15m in front, dodging lobster pots and wakes! Another huge pat on the back to Wahoo as despite the conditions we all felt very safe and perversely all enjoyed the experience

Town nearly all closed down for the night, minimal lighting in a huge commercial harbour, marina office closed many hours ago, found a berth, tied up, walked to 15 minutes asking every French trawlerman in sight which bars were open, found one with outside seating, patio heaters and some great bar staff who even sold us some very red fleece blankets! Stayed there till 01am, walked back to boat, still fully dressed in offshore kit, took up strategic positions on the boat and pontoon and tried to get some sleep – not good, it gets cold and very damp by 01:30am, then very noisy with trawlers leaving at 03:30. We eventually got up at 04:00, and left at 04:30 in mirror flat seas. Just before 05:00 over our left shoulder we had a fantastic light show of a bright purple sun rising in the East!

We were calling the Marina in Brighton for berthing at 06:45, having covered 98 nautical miles in 2 hours 15 minutes, averaging 43.5 knots/hour! Another brilliant performance by the boat which did all it was asked of.

The other crews, once again cheered us in with a large breakfast! This time we all set off for a final time all together!! The last leg was Brighton to Portland with a muster point some 15 miles off Portland so that we could all enter Portland as one group. The last leg was also relaxed day, where speeds and messing about were the order of the day! Just before the forts that mark the entrance into the Solent between Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight we saw four other Ribs and decided to buzz them in a Shropshire kind of way! We did a ‘fly past a just over 84mph! Then a fast circle around the middle fort, past Cowes then raced down to the Needles, some of the video approaching the Needles is amazing (and can be seen on you tube); we waited for the other boats then we all raced in close order the final 40 miles ready for the final parade in front of the press into our berths in the new Olympic Marina in Portland.

For Cool Running it was a hollow victory, we didn’t get round Ireland and Scotland, but we did finish, and are nominated for the crew putting in greatest effort away from the legs to get back in! We covered over 1,200 miles, and had some great times alongside a lot of frustration at things directly outside our control. I’ve learnt an awful lot, about weather, wind, night sailing and people handling, even though from years of sailing you think you know it, and through your working life you think you know it; extreme circumstances cause different people to react in different ways, I made the right call in turning round, but still wish we had pushed on as I know the boat was more than up to the task.

Next time…!!!!!

To my wife, thank you for all your support, guidance and counsel, to my crew, well done excellent effort, to my friends and supporters, thanks again for your continued and generous support and to my still good friends Wayne and David, we did it, let’s get ready for the next one, it’s going to be large!! To Paul and Julian at Wahoo, a very big thank you for all your effort and tireless patience with my frequent requests and questions – the Boat is a head turner, stylish yet practical and fit for purpose – without that partnership this trip would not have happened.

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(a)    Bow damaged on the Irish return to Falmouth after stuffing in very heavy seas

(b)   Force 6 to 7 seas hampering our return to Portland

(c)    Timing and logistics to get back in heavy seas, repair the boat, trailer up to Hollyhead, launch and power across to Bangor NI to rejoin for Oban

Issues on the Baltimore leg, worsening weather conditions and damage have all conspired to  unfortunately force us to temporarily retire from the event.

My support team have contacted all remaining leg participants with the decision to retire; all of whom have understood the issues and acknowledged the decisions taken.

We fully intend to organise a series of events to replicate the legs taken by all participants in this event, and are grateful for their continued support and acceptance of the situation.

After all the tremendous effort exerted by so many in recent months, both in terms of the fantastic support from Wahoo during the build process, logistics and general support, we are gutted to have to take this decision, but find ourselves with little option.

I will personally contact all leg participants this week to discuss the events and decisions  and how best to move forward

Thank you,

Rob Hancocks, Skipper, Cool Running / End

got word from the organisers that all other RIBs were spread out across Southern Ireland; with the Helm of one of the buddy boats we had been travelling to Baltimore with had been taken off to A&E in Cork, where he stayed overnight, and as at 12:00 today was still in hospital – our thoughts are most definately with him.

The main rally group took an off-day today to recover from in some cases a 16 hour pounding over the 220nm; we got back into Falmouth around 16:00 and collapsed with quite a few emotions. After a good nights sleep, but with failing weather still coming over from Ireland, Wayne and I planned for several options to go forward – give in all together, offer south coast England legs time and time again to all leg participants, power to Swansea, then across to Wexford up to Dublin then onto Bangor NI to catch up before joining with the leg to Oban; the weather forecast for today and tomorrow for South-West and Wales was for a Force 4 to 5 increasing to 6, gusting to 7, not where you want to be as a single boat without support unless you really need to be there! So, we decided to plough eastwards stopping off in Salcombe, in what was published to be a Force 3 to 5 with 28kn winds, and then on to Portland, get the boat out of the water, and trailer up to north Wales to cross to Bangor NI to meet everyone else for the Friday leg to Oban.

The trip from Falmouth to Salcombe was fantastic (no guests, no worries, into a head sea with a 2′ to 3′ swell, where we were topping out at 72mph (63kn/hr)). The intention is to get into Portland by 11:30 Tuesday, boat retrieved, the manufacturers will be with us from Southampton to repair the bow  damage after one particular stuff in a following sea on Sunday’s return to Falmouth; then trailer up to Holyhead, ready for a Wednesday AM launch over to Bangor NI.

Weather patterns are clearing for next 4 to 5 days, all legs are back on track from Bangor onwards!

We will contact all leg participants via my PA to re-confirm travel and general logistics remaining in place as before, and look forward to getting back on with it!

A massive thank you to all the people in the background who were gutted at the leg retirement, concerned about the bruises and pains, and the encouragement to get it back on track, my wife especially!

Rob Hancocks, Cool Running 22:08 14/06/2010

The run from Falmouth to Lands End went well with all RIBs staying in close contact with their agreed buddy boats, passing the famous point within the hour; from the waypoint off in a direct line to Baltimore was approx 160nm. The seas and wind were stiffening from the north-West initially to around Force 3; head sea with short waves around the boats length, not the most comfortable state considering we ideally needed to maintain 30knots to reach land before the approaching system hit; the approaching system arrived ahead of notified time, picking up to Force 4 to 5 with occasional 6 gusting.

Approximately 60nm out into the Atlantic after 3 hours one of the guest crew became increasingly upset with the position, condition and probable time left to conclude the leg. After discussion and agreement with Wayne, I decided the safest option for the crew with heavily deteriorating seas ahead was to retire and turn into the now following sea and head back around 90nm into Falmouth; we got back into Mylor Yacht Haven just over 3 hours later.

We were contacted by the event land support at 17:00 to ascertain our location, as very few crews were yet contactable; with a later call at 20:00 from one of the main organisers again to confirm location and safe arrival. At that point 4 boats were still unaccounted for, and sadly a crew member from one of the RIBs has been taken off with back injuries.

At the time of writing this blog (22:27) 2 of the 4 boats have now arrived and the final two are not far behind. Of the RIBs successfully getting across to Ireland, several have taken shelter in various ports and harbours along the South coast.

There will be a phone briefing tomorrow morning, however the weather system bearing from the North-West is growing, and will continue until late Monday evening. We have decided to speak at length with the organisers in the morning and establish if we can safely rejoin and at which stop-over. If after that discussion and taking all possible weather reporting into account across Scotland and the North sea legs, we determine it not safe to rejoin with guests onboard, then with huge sadness we will formally retire from the rally.

We are fully aware of the great lengths all of our supporters, sponsors and leg participants have gone to, both logistically and financially, but the final decision must be based primarily on safety of all crew, both the full-time helm and throttle and the guests in seat’s 3 and 4. We entered this event with two prime objectives – to raise as much money for Hope House and the Great Western Air Ambulance as possible, and to have a safe great time.

I will be in contact with all leg participants tomorrow after the rally briefing and phone con with our decision.

At the end of a long day, all are now accounted for and safely ashore.

Rob Hancocks, Cool Running

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