Ronnie Simpson had come to within 200 miles of compatriot Cole Brauer when they were sailing north of the Kerguelens. It is then that Ronnie discovered to nasty rips on his mainsail and was force to take the mainsail down for repairs. Inevitably he lost lots of miles in the process with the gap between the two skippers going from 175 miles on the 11th of December to 486 on the 18th of December. A loss of over over 300 miles. However, in the week 19 to 26 December Ronnie re-gained over 200 miles making good more than a mile extra for every hour sailed, bringing the gap to under 300 miles: 277 on the morning of the 26th December. The question remains as to weather Ronnie will stop in Hobart as he had planned when discovering the rips on the mainsail, what seems clear is that at this pace Ronnie could soon undermine Cole’s second place.
