Global Ocean Race - Into the Trades and across the Equator

Late on Friday, the final two Class40s in the double-handed Global Ocean Race (GOR) shook-off the Doldrums and dug into the South-East Trades as Phesheya-Racing and Sec. Hayai in fifth and sixth place picked up speed after three days of frustrating conditions. Just after 23:00 GMT on Friday, Cessna Citation crossed the Equator in third place and 15 hours later, Financial Crisis in fourth also entered the Southern Hemisphere with all four Class40’s on a shy reach with around 12  knots of breeze forward of the beam.

Approximately 360 miles south of Cessna Citation and 250 miles off the coast of Brazil, Campagne de France was gradually adding miles to the Franco-British team’s lead over BSL in second as the two Class40s reached south averaging 10 knots in 14 knots of easterly breeze separated by 37 miles at midday on Saturday.

For Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire on Phesheya-Racing, the final hours before picking up speed early on Friday evening were excrutiating: “We really had to work to finally escape the clutches of the Doldrums,” reported Leggatt on Saturday morning. “Yesterday morning found us beating into a SSW wind, coming from the exact direction we wanted to go and neither tack seemed to pay.” The South African duo were desperate to use every breath of wind to keep moving: “Port tack rapidly took us back into an area of no wind and starboard tack had the wind increase, but rapidly head us to the east,” he explains. “I lost track of how many times we tacked, trying to wiggle our way into the SE Trade Winds. With each tack we tried a combination of ballast arrangements and stacking of all loose gear, so it was a very full morning.”

On Friday afternoon, the wind began to arrive and Leggatt and Hutton-Squire switched from upwind Code Zero to Solent, but during the sail change a crack was discovered in the bowsprit mounting. “This is potentially quite a serious problem, at least as far as performance is concerned,” says Leggatt and a lashing was swiftly fitted to take pressure and load off the damaged area. After a quick investigation, the bobstay system running from the outboard end of the bowsprit to a point on the stem just above the waterline was found to be the culprit. “I climbed into my harness and Phillippa lowered me over the bow on the end of the staysail halyard,” he explains. “It was a precarious situation with the boat crashing to windward in a choppy sea, but we managed to remove both the inner and the outer bobstays, replace them and modify the system slightly so that hopefully it will relieve some of the strain on the deck mountings.”