25.03.2006
Race Report
Seamless win for ABN AMRO ONE
March 25, 2006, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – ABN AMRO ONE sailed a faultless race out on Guanabara Bay to win the fourth in-port race of the Volvo Ocean Race 2005-06 in front of a fleet of 1100 spectator boats.
Skipper Mike Sanderson and his crew took an early lead in the race and crossed the finish line just under two and half hours later to beat second placed movistar by a little over two minutes.
A delighted Sanderson said: “The boat was immaculately prepared for today’s race and the guys onboard did a great job – it was just magic and I was lucky to be holding the wheel.”
He continued: “We didn’t put a foot wrong. We started well and did not get overtaken by a single boat the whole way through the race. It is one of the best days yachting that we have had on this boat.”
During the race all five of the other boats held second place at some stage and the points were extremely hard fought. After plenty of jostling, movistar went on to take second place and after facing a race against time to repair the boat after leg four, movistar skipper Bouwe Bekking (NED) was content to settle with this.
“I am quite happy about our result” said Bekking, who continued by saying:
“You always race for first but today second feels good. ABN AMRO ONE sailed a superb race and deserved to win. We manoeuvred the boat well around the course but ABN AMRO ONE had slightly more speed upwind. It couldn’t have been a better day out on the bay and it was great to see all the spectator boats out to watch the race.”
Paul Cayard’s Pirates of the Caribbean looked set to take second place at one point until a boat handling error saw them drop down the fleet.
Cayard explained: “We had a snowballing effect at mark four. We gybed too soon and we missed the lay-line to the mark, which was the first problem and then we had to do two quick manoeuvres, two gybes and a spinnaker drop, which wasn’t the end of the world, but when we gybed the jib got wrapped around the headstay and then it got snagged, so even after we unwrapped it we had to drop it.”
For the team onboard The Pirates the day got worse as they took the wrong side of the downwind leg and dropped back to sixth place overall.
Cayard concluded: “It was a tough day and it happens. It is not pleasant to go through but you have to keep your chin up and keep going. In the big scheme of things it’s just a minor set back as we still have a good team, we still have a good boat and everything was going great for first couple of legs and we were racing well. ABN AMRO ONE is just simply faster. We have the capability to race well and we just have to get back on it next Sunday.”
With the points being so sought after a couple of the teams were a bit over zealous at some of the mark roundings. At the first mark local hero’s Brasil 1 were penalised by the on-water umpires with a one turn penalty after infringing a racing rule and tacking within two boat lengths of the mark.
Grael commented: “I think we got a bit too close at the first mark, it probably was a good call from the umpire but I have not seen any video yet so can not judge. When I tacked I thought we were below the other boats line but it was quite marginal so a penalty was understandable. We were pushing hard as we wanted to get a good result and I probably ended up being too anxious.”
Skipper Sebastien Josse (FRA) on ABN AMRO TWO also received a penalty when he touched the buoy at the penultimate mark rounding.
In the end the podium positions went to the boats that made the least errors, and after moving up from fourth place overall, it was Ericsson who took the final podium spot.
New skipper John Kostecki (USA) summed up the teams day: “The guys did a good job today. Our goal was to get a podium finish and we accomplished that so we are all quite happy. We had an okay start, it wasn’t as good as we hoped and we felt we gave the rest of the fleet a little advantage, but we managed to recover nicely and the crew did a fabulous job. We minimised the mistakes and the other teams made more mistakes.”
He concluded: “It was a fun race. There was a lot of lead changing so it was exciting and you could feel the energy on all of the other boats and so it was a fabulous race. I would have to say it is probably the most fun in-port race to date.”
The teams returned to the dockside at the Marina da Gloria in front of a magnificent crowd of 19,000 spectators who cheered all of the boats home, and especially their local hero’s on Brasil 1.
The teams now have a week to prepare for the leg re-start which sees the boat leaving Rio on Sunday 2 April for the 5000 nautical mile journey to Baltimore.
In-port race results
1st ABN AMRO ONE, Mike Sanderson (NZL) 3.5 pts
2nd Movistar, Bouwe Bekking (NED) 3 pts
3rd Ericsson Racing Team, John Kostecki (USA) 2.5 pts
4th Brasil 1, Torben Grael (BRA) 2 pts
5th ABN AMRO TWO, Sebastien Josse (FRA) 1.5 pts
6th Pirates of the Caribbean, Paul Cayard (USA) 1 pt
Current Leaderboard
[position/team name/skipper/race points to date]
1st ABN AMRO ONE, Mike Sanderson (NZL) 52.5 pts
2nd ABN AMRO TWO, Sebastien Josse (FRA) 36.5 pts
3rd Pirates of the Caribbean, Paul Cayard (USA) 31.5 pts
4th Movistar, Bouwe Bekking (NED) 31.0 pts
5th Brasil 1, Torben Grael (BRA) 28.5 pts
6th Ericsson Racing Team John Kostecki (USA) 23.5 pts
ownHoneHon
For further information contact:
Sacha Oswald Volvo Ocean Race Press Officer in Rio de Janeiro:
Mob: +55 21 8266 6906 Email: sacha.oswald@volvooceanrace.org
Lizzie Green Press Officer at race headquarters:
Tel: +44 1489 554 832, Mob: +44 7801 185 320
Email: lizzie.green@volvooceanrace.org
Sophie Luther Press Assistant at race headquarters
Mob: +44 7956 285548 email: sophie.luther@volvooceanrace.org
Follow The Race...On Your Mobile
Get latest position updates and news sent to your phone. SMS "Alert" to +46 737 49 49 49. Get the Mobile Portal to enhance your experience. SMS "Join" +46 737 49 49 49. Mobilized By Ericsson
… online
www.volvooceanrace.org.
Royalty free images for editorial use are available from the Image Archive at http://media.vemuk.com.
Port accreditation and sign up to the Volvo Ocean Race press information service is available online at https://accreditation.volvooceanrace.org.
|
