The B&G Report- Volvo Ocean Race - Mark Chisnell Previews Leg 4

by Mark Chisnell on 4 Feb 2015 Top Volvo Ocean Race correspondent, navigator and sailing analyst, Mark Chisnell writes a regular report for B&G on the current race and trends he sees developing. This week he previews Leg 4.

Leg 4 runs from Sanya at the southern tip of China to Auckland, New Zealand. So we are back to racing north to south – just like Leg 1 – and we will be back to crossing distinctly different climates. The earth’s climate zones lie in horizontal bands, looping the globe, running out from the Equator to the Poles. In contrast, the previous leg was raced from west to east and remained in one climate zone – the north-east monsoon.


The north-east monsoon is also where this leg will start - but it will start by going east rather than south. In fact, the initial course lies just slightly north of due east to get across the South China Sea. The race course then runs around the northern tip of the Philippines, before the boats can turn south-east into the Pacific. They then leave Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands to starboard, before the long stretch through the South Pacific, past Vanuatu and Fiji before landing in the City of Sails.

Potentially Brutal:

The opening section has the potential to be pretty brutal. Anyone who has followed the race before will remember stories of the conditions in the Luzon Strait – the stretch of water between the Philippines and Taiwan. This can be boat breaking stuff if the north-east monsoon is blowing strongly down the South China Sea.

We’re a long way out from the restart – this is written five days before the gun goes – but the current forecast says that the north-east monsoon will be blowing good and hard on Sunday. Anyone on those boats prone to seasickness needs to stock up on the strong medicine before the re-start.

For the rest of this Preview click here