Clipper Round the World Yacht Race skippers curse wind gods
by Heather Ewing on 19 May 2012
Geraldton Western Australia - Clipper 11-12 Round the World Yacht Race Abner Kingman/onEdition
Clipper 2011-12 Round the World Yacht Race fleet are on the fifth day of race eleven from Panama to New York. It’s been another frustrating day for the ten-strong fleet of ocean racing yachts. Today’s skipper reports to the Race Office are filled with curses to the wind gods as well as a number of tactical gambles as each team looks to outdo its closest rivals.
Visit Finland along with Geraldton Western Australia and Welcome to Yorkshire have entered Stealth Mode over the last 24 hours, which has allowed Gold Coast Australia to retake the lead of Race 11, a day after it claimed maximum points at the Scoring Gate.
Geraldton Western Australia skipper, Juan Coetzer, explains his team’s tactical decision. 'Last night we saw that we were not going to make the Scoring Gate as one of the first three teams to cross. So we opted for a different tactic by playing our Stealth Mode card.
'The wind has been kind to us but we had to work rather hard to keep on moving through the wind holes.' Geraldton Western Australia’s position will be hidden from the Race Viewer and the rest of the fleet until 1400 UTC today, while Visit Finland’s and Welcome to Yorkshire’s positions will not be reported until 0000 UTC and 0600 UTC tomorrow respectively.
Stealth Mode allows the teams to hide their positions from the rest of the fleet for a period of 24 hours, enabling them to spring some tactical surprises. The Race Office still tracks their positions every hour.
Latest boat positions (0900 UTC)
Position Team - DTF / DTL
1 Gold Coast Australia - 1112NM / 0NM
2 De Lage Landen - 1113NM / 1NM
3 New York - 1117NM / 6NM
4 Derry-Londonderry - 1123NM / 11NM
5 Visit Finland - 1123NM / 11NM
6 Qingdao - 1123NM / 12NM
7 Welcome to Yorkshire - 1127NM / 16NM
8 Singapore - 1146NM / 35NM
9 Edinburgh Inspiring Capital - 1152NM / 41NM
10 Geraldton Western Australia - 1186NM / 74NM
Full positions are updated every three hours and can be found
online.
www.clipperroundtheworld.com/" target="_blank">Clipper Round the World Yacht Race website
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