17.11.2008
Right out west!
With the islands of Cape Verde emerging across the fleet’s course, the
choice of trajectories was vast within the leading group and, although there
weren’t any big upsets in the position report, the east west separation
adopted by the leaders could reshuffle the cards in the rankings over the
next two days.
Keenly watching the proceedings Dominique has been eyeing the chess game at
the front of the fleet and the feedback so far backs up his choice of
course. For the past 48 hours the skipper has shifted across to the west, a
strategy which was penalising Temenos II yesterday, but should now enable
him to avoid the wind shadow of the islands of Cape Verde, and above all be
better prepared to tackle the passage through the Doldrums.
Contacted at the start of the afternoon Dominique answered the questions
from his team with a smile in his voice: “It’s very grey weather; the light
is very white. I have between 15 and 20 knots of wind and, for the time
being the seas aren’t really big and I have all the sail aloft. The
automatic pilot is doing a good job but I go and help it at the helm from
time to time because there are few waves so the boat is having some
difficulty surfing. I’ve had more wind since midnight, and as the pilot was
helming well that enabled me to get a little sleep.”
In the clutches of a zone of high pressure throughout yesterday, Temenos II
conceded 13th place to Akéna Vérandas, but questioned about his position to
the west of his group, Dominique didn’t have any regrets about his course.
After shifting to the west of the archipelago of Cape Verde, the skipper
thus hoped to avoid the wind shadow of the islands, as is the case of the
group led by Virbac Paprec. “I am happy with my W’ly option, even though it
cost me some miles yesterday. I was caught by a zone of high pressure and I
lost ground but I tried to make up as much as possible of that today. I have
a good angle in relation to the wind, which is allowing me to make some
fairly good averages. It was a position based on gains in the long term.
Statistically it’s the ideal trajectory but from time to time there are
zones of high pressure dotted about the course, which can spoil even the
best calculations.”
For the next 48 hours, the weather forecasts don’t agree with each other.
“The different American and French models don’t concur, but on average
neither of them give too much wind so it’s clearly not a lively tradewind.”
The index focus is less concerned with the sickly tradewind however. Instead
all eyes are turning towards the Doldrums. “It is fairly spread out at the
moment. I’m targeting a little gateway that I spotted, which may work on
Thursday or Friday, but we’re still a long way off for the forecast to be
reliable.”
Well rested, skipper Dominique admitted that he was going to enjoy and make
the most of the great sailing conditions by taking the helm of his boat.
“Down below it is sticky and heavy so it’s more pleasant to be at the helm”,
and if that enables the skipper to up the pace still further then who could
wish for more…
Translated by Kate Jennings – Expression
|
