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Volvo Ocean Race 2011/2012 - Leg 7 - Miami - Lissabon - Start 20.05.2012
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May 24, 2012 - 1900 UTC Leg 7 Day 5
TOO LATE FOR COLD FRONT AS FLEET headS TOWARDS ICE GATES
Leg 7 24/05/2012 19:01:14 UTC
&xnbsp; DTL DTLC BS DTF
1 TELE 0.00 0 12.5 2260.8 2 ADOR 21.30 0 11.5 2282.2 3 CMPR 27.80 1 12.7 2288.7 4 PUMA 34.10 2 11.2 2295.0 5 GPMA 47.40 18 6.8 2308.2 6 SNYA 65.50 3 13.5 2326.4
The quick Atlantic crossing to Lisbon, Portugal, has taken an unexpected twist, as the cold front the fleet had been hoping to hook into for a fast ride fast across the North Atlantic was moving too quickly, slamming the door shut and forcing some quick thinking.“We all missed the train and we’re waiting for the next one, which is expected to come in from the northwest and that’s while we are climbing up,” explained Xabi Fernandez, trimmer with leg leaders Telefónica (Iker Martínez/ESP).
Having missed the opportunity for a fast ride towards the finish, the fleet has gybed north and are heading towards the ice gates put in place to keep the fleet south of the ice brought south on the cold Labrador current.“The latest bit of ice was spotted at latitude 46 degrees north. At the moment we’re headed to get above it. Bring on the freeze,” said Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing’s navigator, Jules Salter.“The boats behind have a bit more breeze right now, so they’ll be notching up some good data in the next few hours. The situation we have coming up is quite thorny indeed. We’re going to hit a high pressure system tomorrow and then we will get the next squall, where we hope we’ll get away again. It will be interesting,” said Telefónica navigator Andrew Cape, who made the call to head east again shortly after 1300 GMT.
For CAMPER with Emirates Team New Zealand (Chris Nicholson/AUS), who found themselves further south than they wanted, it has been a particularly painful two days following the decision by the afterguard to abandon the south and take the high road north.“We took a couple of big shifts to the north. The reindexs of tropical storm Alberto were still around, so we got a bit of a shove from that. Right at the moment, we are reaping some of the benefits from it,” explained navigator Will Oxley earlier.The leaderboard reshuffled at 1600 GMT today, with Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing (Ian Walker/GBR) moving up to second place, with CAMPER eight miles behind and Groupama slipping to fourth. At 1900 GMT Groupama had slipped further down the field to fifth place. Having hit a light spot, the team was sailing at almost half the speed of the rest of the fleet. They are positioned midway between Telefónica who is heading east and the rest of the fleet who are continuing to claw northeast.
The fleet is now spread 65 nm from Telefónica in first to Sanya in sixth place, with a north/south divide of 68 nm.So far, the course from Miami to Lisbon has produced flat water downwind sailing under clear blue skies, unexpected conditions enjoyed by all. “Normally it’s grey, miserable and cold and probably freezing at this stage, as we are usually up around Newfoundland, so we will definitely take this,” said Justin Slattery, bowman with Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing.Far from being a drag race to the finish, the current weather situation, although tricky, has presented plenty of options for the chasing pack who are picking their way through the minefield. Fortunately, although many miles have been lost in the claw north, there is still over 2,000 nm left to run in this 3,590 nm leg to Lisbon, which is plenty enough runway to provide for some changes in the leaderboard.
May 24, 2012 - 0700 UTC, Leg 7 Day 5
TELEFÓNICA TAKE TOP SPOT AS FLEET GYBES NORTH
Leg 7 24/05/2012 7:03:11 UTC
&xnbsp; DTL DTLC BS DTF
1 TELE 0.00 0 12.1 2381.1 2 GPMA 9.50 1 11.1 2390.7 3 ADOR 48.00 2 14.1 2429.1 4 PUMA 72.00 4 14.5 2453.1 5 CMPR 87.50 6 15.5 2468.6 6 SNYA 119.00 3 15.3 2500.1
Leg 7 had a new frontrunner early on Thursday in the form of overall race leaders Telefónica, who snatched the top spot from French rivals Groupama as the teams were forced to head north to dodge a high pressure system blocking the direct path towards Lisbon.Iker Martínez’s men were almost 10 nautical miles ahead of Franck Cammas’ team at the 0700 UTC position report and travelling more than a knot quicker after all six boats had gybed north in search of better breeze.CAMPER with Emirates Team New Zealand were the first of the chasing teams to gybe north on Wednesday, and this morning Sanya, PUMA Ocean Racing powered by BERG and Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing followed suit.Telefónica and Groupama were the last of the fleet to make the move, and at the latest position report all six teams were sailing north-easterly courses.
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Sanya bei Sonnenuntergang
Foto: Andres Soriano
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CAMPER skipper Chris Nicholson said that while costly, the split was a necessary move to keep them in the game. At 0700 it seemed to be paying as they averaged 15.5 knots, the quickest boat in the fleet, pulling back more than six miles in three hours.“The boats to the north of us were continuing gaining on us in more pressure, and we are going to have to take a loss to go there, but the future wasn’t looking good staying in the south,” Nicholson said.“We are going to take some more losses to get back into pressure and try to get back in touch with these guys.”Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, this morning in third place almost 50 nm behind the leaders, were banking on a leaderboard reshuffle in their favour as they relished being in the thick of the action.
“For a few days we have clung to the hope that we could just about ride the southwesterly wind east and connect with the westerly flow round the Azores High that would deliver us to Lisbon,” skipper Ian Walker said. “It was a dream scenario – a very direct and downwind route that avoided the ice gates to the north. “Sadly reality is now being faced by the fleet as we gybe north one by one. Ahead of us we face a very light wind high pressure zone to cross, a day of upwind sailing, much colder temperatures and a few more days at sea. At least it will feel like a ‘real’ Atlantic crossing.“I suspect we could see a real shake up in the standings with some big gains and losses. After getting ourselves into a good position thus far our priority is to put ourselves in as safe a position as we can relative to the others.” &xnbsp;
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