Global Ocean Race - Gunning for the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate

The double-handed, Class40 Global Ocean Race 2011-12 (GOR) leaders are at full pace, closing in on the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Conrad Colman and Sam Goodchild on the Akilaria RC2, Cessna Citation, are blasting ahead in first place, just a handful of miles from the scoring gate, consistently averaging over 14 knots despite halyard issues and increasing their lead over Campagne de France and BSL. Further north and trailing the leading trio by 366 miles at 15:00 GMT on Saturday, Financial Crisis and Phesheya-Racing have locked down as the cold front sweeping eastwards pounces on the two Class40s.

On Phesheya-Racing in fifth place, the South African duo of Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire have been watching the cold front approach and are expecting a sudden, strong, icy blast of wind from the south: “How can we even begin to prepare ourselves for this, one might ask?” says Hutton-Squire. “Well, we’ve been getting as much sleep as possible, eating, securing and stacking everything down below,” she reports. “Most importantly, we’ve been keeping a careful watch on the weather and how the low has been moving. This is crucial as we don’t want to have too much wind that we can’t handle and we have to be careful and look after the boat. We are not even half way round the world yet, so we need to sail in winds that we can cope with.”

Further east in fourth place and marginally north of the South Africans, Marco Nannini and Hugo Ramon were averaging just under ten knots on Financial Crisis and keeping ahead of the front on Saturday morning: “The cold front is about to reach us and behind us I can see broken clouds and some blue sky here and there,” reported Nannini at noon GMT on Saturday. “It rained earlier and the wind has kept on backing,” he adds, noting the early physical signs of impending strong breeze. “However, as we are sailing relatively fast in the same direction as the front, it is taking forever to overtake us.” While Nannini and Ramon are currently 29 miles ahead of Phesheya-Racing, the leaders further south are pulling away from Financial Crisis. 

“The front runners, who kept in a belt with more wind, may be able to stay ahead of the front for some time and still clock a tremendous amount of miles,” confirms the Italian skipper. “For us, the game is different; we’re too far back to play the same route and we’ll be pushed to stay further north to avoid a high pressure that would swallow us in a few days,” he adds, breaking away from his forecasting and looking out of the companionway hatch: “I can see sunshine breaking through the clouds! The front will be over us any moment I guess!”

 

Conrad Colman and Artemis Offshore Academy sailor, Sam Goodchild, have been leading the fleet uninterrupted with Cessna Citation since Friday afternoon, averaging 13, then 14 and 14 knots-plus, building a lead of 30 miles over Campagne de France at 15:00 GMT despite an action-packed Friday night. “Things here got a little spicy last night,” reported Colman on Saturday morning. “The fractional 2:1 halyard chafed through in the dark, but we recovered the Code 5 without damage.”