278 degrees, 11.79 miles to the finish in 24 metres, kedged for 4 hours!   On Friday we cleaned the bottom of the boat knowing we were forecast light winds. Thank goodness the start was postponed for an hour, it gave time for the wind to build and the adverse tide to reduce. The start was fine with spinnaker up in a reasonable time and off we went cheating the tide as much as possible along the Island shore. Gurnard ledge had plenty of water so no need to go out into the stream there.  We had a bit of a tussle to get out of Alchemist’s wind shadow and having done that led the fleet for a while as the higher raters were out in the stronger tide. All progressed well until just before Hampstead Ledge when we noticed Long Pierre’s kite collapsing in the start of the sea breeze so it was genoa up and kite down in good order before the sea breeze  reached us. The beat to the Needles went well apart from one poor tack out to the middle just short of Yarmouth that lost us distance to the leaders. The plan was to beat down the Island shore to pick up the first of the ebb but for some reason or other we went out too far and lost out. Hurst narrows was fine as the tide had fully turned by then and the strong set into the North Channel was worth using carefully, we once hit NE Shingles very hard!!  Once towards the bottom of the Shingles Bank we set off across the bay for our waypoint South of Anvil Point.  Rattler had chosen to go North of the Shingles and Long Pierre was ahead and to leeward across the bay. Some good way across the bay Long Pierre disappeared into the fog bank. Once we reached the fog bank Girolle was to leeward, Alchemist behind her and Whistler to windward. It all got much murkier and we never saw them again. Around Anvil Point in the fog the sea breeze disappeared, Imperator crossed close astern approaching St Albans. We crossed the ledge around 4pm and proceeded to within 10.5 miles of the finish before we then started gybing across the tide with the spinnaker now in use and slowly moving back towards the ledge. When we got back to 11.78 miles from the finish at 7:15 pm we decided to drop the kedge and wait for the tide to turn. We did have a bit of a debate about retiring but being well placed in the series and the tide likely to get us to the finish around 6am in time to turn for home we stuck it out. Before the tide turned the fog lifted and we expected to see a forest of anchor lights in the bay but none could be seen. During the evening we had heard a few boats on the radio attempting to contact JOG one so we assumed they had retired. With no meal in Weymouth in prospect we went down to short rations for the evening bite to eat needing to preserve some sustenance for the return leg. By 11pm the bow wave had disappeared and at 11:15 the anchor line had reversed direction so up it came and we started the slow crawl across the bay towards the finish. We started at under a knot  and at times got over two knots on the GPS. The wind instrument wouldn’t register the wind strength it was so low and the log hardly ever registered boat speed. However by 5 am we could see Night Owl and Old Mother Gun abeam over by Portland harbour and Longue Pierre approaching the finish. Long Pierre radioed her finish time as 05:28, we were then 1.75 miles to the finish and travelling at 0.8 knots over the ground. We did a quick mental calculation and worked out we needed to finish by 06:32 to beat Longue Pierre, at the speed we were travelling that distance would take us over two hours. We needed over two knots for quite some time to beat them. With 45 minutes to our target time the breeze built slightly and our speed went up to 2 knots, then 2.5 and it was game on. Approaching DG range the kite would no longer fly so the genoa was hoisted and remarkably the speed went up (beware the stalled spinnaker). We crossed the line at 06:30 just inside our target time. Having finished we had a quick word with Peter Chartres and set off straight back to Cowes. Recalculating using a calculator this time instead of a sleep deprived brain we realised the mental arithmetic was a bit out and we had in fact another 15 minutes or so to spare, a nice win after such a long race, however with a  4 hour kedge the low rating boat will gain an immense corrected time advantage. Many thanks to all the race officers and especially Peter Chartres for being at the finish at such an early hour.