Leslie persists as a large, highly-sheared tropical storm, with the models and NHC staying rather bullish on her in the extended period, now taking a significant, and possibly major hurricane right by Bermuda over the coming weekend.

Being that large systems are more difficult to shear out, and that later in the week shear is expected to lessen as Leslie enters what is forecast to be a very favorable upper air environment, it seems reasonable to assume that the consensus (and official) forecast could very well play out.

All that said, the cyclone looks especially challenged this morning, and it is possible that NHC's current intensity estimate of 65 MPH gets throttled back later today or tomorrow.

Further weakening could result in substantial changes to the forecast at 3-5 days out.