Tauranga yachts Windarra and Open Country are among the 19 yachts starting the final leg of the SSANZ Round North Island Race from Napier at 10am today.

Windarra's skipper Will Horne says the race start was delayed to let high winds round East Cape tail off.

Tauranga based yacht, Windarra, is closing in on the home stretch of the SSANZ Round North Island Race.

'There's forecast 35 knots later on tonight, that's as windy as its going to get,” says Will. The race was going to restart yesterday, but the forecast was for gusting 60knots, so it was delayed until this morning.

The forecast is for a two metre southerly swell.

'It's going to be a following sea which is a lot easier to manage than big waves crashing on top of you, and dropping off them,” says Will.

'It's been a bit of a battle, but this leg looks like it's going to be a lot easier sailing.”

Will's rejecting the option of pulling out of the race as the fleet crosses the Bay of Plenty – probably tomorrow.

'We've gone this far, and it looks like it's going to be the easiest leg so far, so we are definitely going to carry on to Auckland, says Will.

The final leg is from Napier around East Cape and crossing the Bay of Plenty to Cape Colville on the northern tip of the Coromandel Peninsula. All the 19 boats that left Wellington are restarting from Napier.

Open Country is the clear winner of leg three in division four, with Windarra fourth on handicap. Only minutes separate Mix T Motions, Pepe and Windarra. There are only five boats left in the division, with seven having pulled out of the race.

The first half of the leg from Wellington was okay, says Will.

'The second half it came round to 40 knots on the nose again, but we kept bashing away and got here eventually.

'We had a park up overnight prior to that, which cost us a fair bit of time, but I think we still ended up fourth on handicap for that leg, which wasn't too bad.”

He's hoping to make Auckland Wednesday night if the wind keeps up.

'It's supposed to die out a little bit on Tuesday night, but if we can get through that alright we should be in Auckland Wednesday night – all things going well.

'If we don't make it to Auckland on Wednesday night, it might be a slow run because the wind is forecast to die a bit on Thursday.”