We saw sustained 50+ knots for about 30 mins, peak gust that we noticed of 60, and a boat near us saw a 65 knot gust. Wedgetail lost their mast having already crossed the worst of it, near the Brothers. The sea state was pretty friendly, given the wind speed (except at the corners in tide rips), since the gradient wind was curving around the top of the South Island ... so not a huge amount of fetch. We didn't take video in the really windy bits (ran out of camera battery) but just before we entered Cook Strait we got this:
In 50+ knots upwind, Blink was still pointing well, fast and easy to handle with storm jib and 3 reefs. We did hoist a Fractional Zero briefly to leave the harbour, perhaps 10 minutes of downwind sailing but with 40+ knots too much breeze for the A6. Probably ;-). We also used a masthead zero for a couple of hours near the south end of D'Urville Island. But not a single downwind sail for a 120nm (rhumb line) offshore race...
So the downwind weaponry had to wait until the return trip, the delivery back to Wellington ... this was a great sail, crossing the Strait faster than the ferry when the breeze picked up on the eastern side.