01.02.2008
Day 83: 2 000 miles to glory
The leading boat in the Barcelona World Race, Paprec-Virbac 2 is now less than 2 000 miles from the finishing line, which translates to about 10 more days of racing. With a 462 mile lead on Hugo Boss, the situation is comfortable for the race leader, but by no means assured as Damian Foxall explained today as stronger winds - up to 30 knots! - have seen their boat speed rise, as well as their stress level.
"I'm beating my brains out...or at least the boat is," Damian said today on the video conference. "We're sailing pretty fast, cracked off the wind, heading due north. Running the miles down, putting some north in now so that we can tack over towards Gibraltar tonight or tomorrow morning.It's nice to see the speedo up but it brings some stress as well. The boat is always on our minds, we're doing a lot of banging and crashing. It's a bit worrying every time you jump off a wave and land on the other side of it. (But) it's a great boat and there's no reason why we can't keep going like this."
Current weather routing software puts Paprec-Virbac 2 sailing through the Strait of Gibraltar on the 8th of February, making a finish on the 11th likely. That will be exactly three months since the start of the race on November 11th - and not a moment too soon for Damian.
"It's funny you should mention this is day 83," he said laughing this afternoon. "I think I'm beginning to know what it feels like to be 83 years old! But if we can hold on to the finish we'll have really achieved something great for ourselves and the team."
The battle for third place is still very close with Temenos II and Mutua Madrileņa racing north together as if attached by a string. The delta is just shy of 100 miles with both boats sailing near identical headings and speeds. And the fight here is more immediate than for the finish - as they race towards the scoring gate at Fernando, both are vying for the best time on this seventh stage of the race.
"It's still a hard fight with Temenos II, that's for sure," said Pachi Rivero from Mutua Madrileņa. "It's been an intense night, with the wind shifting a lot. Tonight we'll be at the gate."
The fifth place boat, Educación sin Fronteras, has been slower over the past 24 hours, stuck in the middle of a low pressure system off the Brazilian coast. While their speed is getting better now, it hasn't been a pleasant 24 hours, with the boat "violently hitting the waves" as a fatigued Servane described today.
Watch 'The Barcelona World Race': Episode Two of the six-part series, 'The Barcelona World Race' is now available to watch online at: http://www.barcelonaworldrace.com/player/. A new episode will be posted each week.
Day 83 - February 1, 14:00 GMT - Position report with distance to leader
1. PAPREC-VIRBAC 2 - Jean Pierre DICK / Damian FOXALL - 1974 to finish
2. HUGO BOSS - Alex THOMSON / Andrew CAPE - 462
3. TEMENOS 2 - Dominique Wavre / Michele PARET- 1396
4. MUTUA MADRILENA - Javier SANSO / Pachi RIVERO - 1493
5. EDUCACION SIN FRONTERAS - Servane ESCOFFIER / Albert BARGUES - 2760
Abandoned - VEOLIA ENVIRONNEMENT - Roland JOURDAIN / Jean Luc NELIAS
Abandoned - ESTRELLA DAMM - Guillermo ALTADILL / JONATHAN MCKEE
Abandoned - DELTA DORE - Jérémie BEYOU / Sidney GAVIGNET
Abandoned - PRB - Vincent Riou / Sebastien JOSSE
In Quotes - Servane Escoffier, Educación sin Fronteras: "It is quite warm now and we are still sailing upwind after having spent a rough night in the middle of this Brazilian low coming from Rio. Last night, the boat was violently hitting the waves and I don't like this because it is never good for the boat even if I climbed the mast a few days ago and I know everything is fine...Of course, it would be great to be the second boat finishing this race without having stopped, but this is not over yet: we already have sailed more than 20 000 miles since last November, that's a lot for me!"
See the multimedia section at www.barcelonaworldrace.org for all the latest photos, videos and audio clips from the race course.
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Lou Newlands
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