With the Leg 2 Global Ocean Race (GOR) winning Class40, Cessna Citation, safely secured by a network of lines and springs at Queens Wharf in Wellington Harbour, the strong winds still persist in and around Cook Strait. As Conrad Colman and Sam Goodchild crossed the finish line late on Friday evening (local), thundering into Wellington Harbour under bright orange storm jib and reefed main, the second-placed Class40 (watch a video of the arrival here), BSL of the New Zealand father-and-son duo, Ross and Campbell Field, was approaching Cape Farewell, 110 miles north-west of Wellington, preparing to turn right, into the teeth of the gale for a beat through Cook Strait.
The Fields rounded Cape Farewell at midday GMT on Friday - in the middle of the New Zealand night - and ran straight into the south-easterly Force 7-8 howling through Cook Strait. BSL tacked briefly onto port towards Golden Bay lying behind the 15-mile long Farewell Spit jutting east into the strait from the cape, with slow and painful progress: “We’re getting the **** kicked out of us,” confirmed Ross Field as BSL slammed into the massive seas. “Just before the wind instruments got blown off the rig, it was 38 knots and then it got windier,” he continued. “Now we estimate a solid 30 knots gusting 40 with breaking seas.”
By midnight GMT on Friday, BSL was off the tip of d’Urville Island on the South Island shore at the gateway to the jaws of Cook Strait: “The poor old boat has suffered some damage and it’s full of water, wet sails and sailing gear - it’s a shambles,” he reports. However, there is also physical damage on board: “The crew are suffering,” he confirms. “Campbell has a black eye from head butting the forestay and I have bruises everywhere from being thrown around the boat.
In a brief call to the GOR Race Organisation at 14:00 local (01:00 GMT) on Saturday, Ross Field reported that the breeze had climbed to a howling 50-60 knots and by 05:00 GMT on Saturday (18:00 local), BSL was heading directly across Cook Strait with 57 miles to the finish line and searching for some shelter on the North Island shore. “Are we enjoying it?” asks Ross Field. “No, but this is only a tiny percentage of some of the best sailing in the world,” he believes. “Congratulations to Cessna,” he added before signing off. “Conrad and Sam sailed brilliantly and thoroughly deserve their win - bloody well done!”
While the Fields battle towards the finish line in strong headwinds, Halvard Mabire and Miranda Merron in third place had been struggling west of South Island with Campagne de France. “I’ve got a really bad feeling that the end of this race will be painful and hard,” said Mabire late on Friday night. “We still have long periods of calm breeze, but the sea is confused and disordered nonetheless,” he confirms. “It feels like we’re in a giant cocktail shaker, and not on the ocean and it would be wise to tell the barman to calm down a bit,” comments Mabire. “It’s not good for business to have someone behind the bar who clearly belongs in an asylum for the criminally insane.” At 05:00 GMT on Saturday, Campagne de France was 35 miles from Cape Farewell averaging under four knots. “It’s no longer possible to just say the sails are slapping or slatting, as it now sounds as if they are going to explode,” he adds. “At least when we arrive in New Zealand we’ll get the warm welcome that all offshore sailors receive and the hardship of this leg through the Indian Ocean will soon recede in our memories.”
On Saturday afternoon (local), Miranda Merron described the scene ten miles off the coast of New Zealand. “We had a long windless patch during the night and have been becalmed for hours today,” she reports. “Less than 40 miles away in the Cook Strait it is blowing dogs off chains, but on this side lies a wide band of no wind, due to fill in some time in the next year or so,” adds Merron. “The mountain scenery is stunning and we’ve seen a whale, dolphins, and birds catching fish - if we weren’t racing, it would be a very pleasant place to hang out for hours!”
For Marco Nannini and Hugo Ramon on Financial Crisis in fourth place, the past two days have been some of the best sailing in Leg 2 for the Italian-Spanish duo as they ascend at an ear-popping rate through the Tasman Sea from 44S towards the west coast of South Island riding SSW wind on the leading edge of a high pressure system and hauling miles from Campagne de France: “Halvard and Miranda were 750 miles ahead of us just a few days back and with a bit of luck, but also by pushing very hard, we brought down the gap to under 240 miles - a 510 miles catch up!” says Nannini. “I doubt we’d have ever had the chance to overtake them, but our goal is to finish within 24 hours of them,” he confirms.
However, it hasn’t all gone well on Financial Crisis. “We had been doing great all night, shaving mile after mile from Halvard and Miranda’s lead over us and were flying the smallest spinnaker, a bullet proof job called the A5, a sail that can be used even if 40 knots of wind, which is not far from what we had,” Nannini explains. “Then, disaster struck, the halyard parted and the sail went down into the water.” With the asymmetric sail acting as an unstable handbrake, the Class40 was hard to control and retrieving the sail quickly was vital. “As you can imagine, trailing a spinnaker in the water in 30-35 knots of wind is likely to cause a few headaches,” adds Nannini with understatement. “We masterminded a way to bring it inside the boat with lines led to winches via hatches and what-not, but it took us a good hour but unfortunately the damage is severe,” confirms the Italian skipper. “At some stage the sail wrapped around the rudder and tore for many metres and we don’t know if it can be saved.” Despite the damage, Financial Crisis was averaging over ten knots at 05:00 GMT, 157 miles off the coast of South Island and continuing to close down on Campagne de France, trailing the Franco-British team by 176 miles.
Furthest west, 520 miles from South Island, the South African duo of Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire were making the best speed in the fleet at 05:00 GMT on Saturday on Phesheya-Racing at 11.2 knots, trailing Nannini and Ramon by 587 miles. “Phesheya has another 12 hours until New Year,” confirmed Hutton-Squire on Satyurday. “We will be 11 hours plus from UTC by the time New Year comes along and I somehow don't think that we will be celebrating with a big party this year! It might just be a cup of tea and a piece of fruit cake!”
GOR leadeboard at 05:00 GMT 31 December:
1. Cessna Citation 30d 22h 20m 40s
2. BSL DTF 57 6.4kts
3. Campagne de France DTL 79 3.5kts
4. Financial Crisis DTL 255 10.3kts
5. Phesheya-Racing DTL 842 11.2kts
GOR cumulative Leg 1 and Leg 2 points:
1. BSL: 39 (4 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
2. Campagne de France: 36 points (5 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
3. Financial Crisis: 27 (3 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
4. Cessna Citation: 24 (6 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate) + 30 points for Leg 2 win
5. Phesheya-Racing: 14 (2 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
6. Sec. Hayai: 6 (RTD from Leg 2)
GOR POINTS SYSTEM EXPLANATION:
The time limit at a finishing line (not a scoring gate) will be 12 days after the first boat has finished, after which time any yacht not finished or retired will be scored DNF.
Scoring Gate Points: A multiplication factor of 1 will apply.
e.g With a 6 boat fleet – winner receives 6 points; second place receives 5 points, third place receives 4 points, last place receives 1 point.
Leg Points: A multiplication factor of 5 will apply.
e.g With a 6 boat fleet – winner receives 30 points, second place receives 25 points, third place receives 20 points, last place receives 5 points.
The Fields rounded Cape Farewell at midday GMT on Friday - in the middle of the New Zealand night - and ran straight into the south-easterly Force 7-8 howling through Cook Strait. BSL tacked briefly onto port towards Golden Bay lying behind the 15-mile long Farewell Spit jutting east into the strait from the cape, with slow and painful progress: “We’re getting the **** kicked out of us,” confirmed Ross Field as BSL slammed into the massive seas. “Just before the wind instruments got blown off the rig, it was 38 knots and then it got windier,” he continued. “Now we estimate a solid 30 knots gusting 40 with breaking seas.”
By midnight GMT on Friday, BSL was off the tip of d’Urville Island on the South Island shore at the gateway to the jaws of Cook Strait: “The poor old boat has suffered some damage and it’s full of water, wet sails and sailing gear - it’s a shambles,” he reports. However, there is also physical damage on board: “The crew are suffering,” he confirms. “Campbell has a black eye from head butting the forestay and I have bruises everywhere from being thrown around the boat.
In a brief call to the GOR Race Organisation at 14:00 local (01:00 GMT) on Saturday, Ross Field reported that the breeze had climbed to a howling 50-60 knots and by 05:00 GMT on Saturday (18:00 local), BSL was heading directly across Cook Strait with 57 miles to the finish line and searching for some shelter on the North Island shore. “Are we enjoying it?” asks Ross Field. “No, but this is only a tiny percentage of some of the best sailing in the world,” he believes. “Congratulations to Cessna,” he added before signing off. “Conrad and Sam sailed brilliantly and thoroughly deserve their win - bloody well done!”
While the Fields battle towards the finish line in strong headwinds, Halvard Mabire and Miranda Merron in third place had been struggling west of South Island with Campagne de France. “I’ve got a really bad feeling that the end of this race will be painful and hard,” said Mabire late on Friday night. “We still have long periods of calm breeze, but the sea is confused and disordered nonetheless,” he confirms. “It feels like we’re in a giant cocktail shaker, and not on the ocean and it would be wise to tell the barman to calm down a bit,” comments Mabire. “It’s not good for business to have someone behind the bar who clearly belongs in an asylum for the criminally insane.” At 05:00 GMT on Saturday, Campagne de France was 35 miles from Cape Farewell averaging under four knots. “It’s no longer possible to just say the sails are slapping or slatting, as it now sounds as if they are going to explode,” he adds. “At least when we arrive in New Zealand we’ll get the warm welcome that all offshore sailors receive and the hardship of this leg through the Indian Ocean will soon recede in our memories.”
On Saturday afternoon (local), Miranda Merron described the scene ten miles off the coast of New Zealand. “We had a long windless patch during the night and have been becalmed for hours today,” she reports. “Less than 40 miles away in the Cook Strait it is blowing dogs off chains, but on this side lies a wide band of no wind, due to fill in some time in the next year or so,” adds Merron. “The mountain scenery is stunning and we’ve seen a whale, dolphins, and birds catching fish - if we weren’t racing, it would be a very pleasant place to hang out for hours!”
For Marco Nannini and Hugo Ramon on Financial Crisis in fourth place, the past two days have been some of the best sailing in Leg 2 for the Italian-Spanish duo as they ascend at an ear-popping rate through the Tasman Sea from 44S towards the west coast of South Island riding SSW wind on the leading edge of a high pressure system and hauling miles from Campagne de France: “Halvard and Miranda were 750 miles ahead of us just a few days back and with a bit of luck, but also by pushing very hard, we brought down the gap to under 240 miles - a 510 miles catch up!” says Nannini. “I doubt we’d have ever had the chance to overtake them, but our goal is to finish within 24 hours of them,” he confirms.
However, it hasn’t all gone well on Financial Crisis. “We had been doing great all night, shaving mile after mile from Halvard and Miranda’s lead over us and were flying the smallest spinnaker, a bullet proof job called the A5, a sail that can be used even if 40 knots of wind, which is not far from what we had,” Nannini explains. “Then, disaster struck, the halyard parted and the sail went down into the water.” With the asymmetric sail acting as an unstable handbrake, the Class40 was hard to control and retrieving the sail quickly was vital. “As you can imagine, trailing a spinnaker in the water in 30-35 knots of wind is likely to cause a few headaches,” adds Nannini with understatement. “We masterminded a way to bring it inside the boat with lines led to winches via hatches and what-not, but it took us a good hour but unfortunately the damage is severe,” confirms the Italian skipper. “At some stage the sail wrapped around the rudder and tore for many metres and we don’t know if it can be saved.” Despite the damage, Financial Crisis was averaging over ten knots at 05:00 GMT, 157 miles off the coast of South Island and continuing to close down on Campagne de France, trailing the Franco-British team by 176 miles.
Furthest west, 520 miles from South Island, the South African duo of Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire were making the best speed in the fleet at 05:00 GMT on Saturday on Phesheya-Racing at 11.2 knots, trailing Nannini and Ramon by 587 miles. “Phesheya has another 12 hours until New Year,” confirmed Hutton-Squire on Satyurday. “We will be 11 hours plus from UTC by the time New Year comes along and I somehow don't think that we will be celebrating with a big party this year! It might just be a cup of tea and a piece of fruit cake!”
GOR leadeboard at 05:00 GMT 31 December:
1. Cessna Citation 30d 22h 20m 40s
2. BSL DTF 57 6.4kts
3. Campagne de France DTL 79 3.5kts
4. Financial Crisis DTL 255 10.3kts
5. Phesheya-Racing DTL 842 11.2kts
GOR cumulative Leg 1 and Leg 2 points:
1. BSL: 39 (4 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
2. Campagne de France: 36 points (5 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
3. Financial Crisis: 27 (3 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
4. Cessna Citation: 24 (6 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate) + 30 points for Leg 2 win
5. Phesheya-Racing: 14 (2 points at the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate)
6. Sec. Hayai: 6 (RTD from Leg 2)
GOR POINTS SYSTEM EXPLANATION:
The time limit at a finishing line (not a scoring gate) will be 12 days after the first boat has finished, after which time any yacht not finished or retired will be scored DNF.
Scoring Gate Points: A multiplication factor of 1 will apply.
e.g With a 6 boat fleet – winner receives 6 points; second place receives 5 points, third place receives 4 points, last place receives 1 point.
Leg Points: A multiplication factor of 5 will apply.
e.g With a 6 boat fleet – winner receives 30 points, second place receives 25 points, third place receives 20 points, last place receives 5 points.
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