The Volvo Ocean Race fleet was punching into the Atlantic on Tuesday
after surviving their first test from the weather gods through the
Gibraltar Strait overnight. Vestas 11th Hour Racing still occupy the top spot after a challenging
first 50 hours of the opening leg from Alicante, Spain, to Lisbon,
Portugal, that has seen them dominate the leaderboard over their six
rivals.
At one point skipper Charlie Enright's crew stretched out their
advantage to more than 27 miles as they were catapulted out of the
Strait by following winds gusting as high as 35 knots. “We had a good night overnight, getting fired out of the Gibraltar
jet,” Vestas 11th Hour Racing navigator Simon 'SiFi' Fisher said. “We
were happy to wake up to see that all of the boats are behind us and
mostly on our line.”
However that lead has started to be whittled away as the frontrunners
reach painfully light winds blocking their path south west as they
point for the turning mark at Porto Santo in the Madeira Islands. Although Vestas 11th Hour Racing still have a comfortable
19-nautical-mile buffer, the 1300 UTC position report revealed that
speeds on the blue boat have dropped to an excruciating 1.7 knots.
Meanwhile Spanish crew MAPFRE, the real winners overnight rocketing
from fourth to second, were making 11.4 knots – the fastest in the fleet
– from their position as the northernmost boat.
MAPFRE skipper Xabi Fernandez worked his team hard through the night,
putting in 11 gybes to stay within a narrow band of pressure. The effort paid off, and MAPFRE were able to overhaul both Sun Hung Kai/Scallywag and team Akzonobel.
“It was tough conditions with winds up to 35 knots, and we had to
throw in some gybes,” explained MAPFRE navigator Joan Vila. “Right now
we are waiting for the shift to gybe to port, and then we know it will
become very tricky and light. To be honest, anything can still happen in
this leg.”
In stark contrast to the past 24 hours of full-on downwind action the
breeze is forecast to drop to less than seven knots and swing 180
degrees, resulting in the fleet sailing upwind in light wind mode. Lying between them and Porto Santo is an enormous wind hole 100
nautical miles wide which the navigators must carefully pick their way
through.
It is highly likely to have a concertina effect on the fleet whereby
any gains made thus far are largely wiped out as the fleet compresses. That's bad news for the leaders but will be welcomed by the likes of
Dongfeng Race Team, Turn the Tide on Plastic and Team Brunel further
back down the track. Turn the Tide on Plastic boat captain Liz Wardley said they were
happy to have just made it through their first big breeze test in one
piece.
“It got pretty hairy last night and we ended up with 36, 37 knots of
breeze downwind gybing through the Strait, avoiding the traffic
separation zone,” she said. “But we got through it pretty well mid
fleet, and now the breeze is slowly dying out. In a few hours' time
we're probably going to have a very different breeze of five to seven
knots. We've had a few transitions to go through and we're just crawling
back into the fleet now after a few losses last night. We've got good
speed on the guys around us so we're looking good.”
The fleet might be slowing down but the action is just heating up.
Leg 1 – Position Report – Tuesday 24 October (Day 3) – 13:00 UTC
- Vestas 11th Hour Racing -- distance to finish -- 813.3 nautical miles
- MAPFRE +19.7nm
- team AkzoNobel + 21.9
- Sun Hung Kai/Scallywag +29.7
- Dongfeng Race Team +30.8
- Turn the Tide on Plastic +32.4
- Team Brunel +32.5
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