Auckland to Fiji Race- TeamVodafoneSailing now making good time

by Richard Gladwell on 2 Jun 2013
TeamVodafonesailing, the ORMA 60 trimaran skippered by Simon Hull is now making good time heading for Musket Cove in Fiji, in the Auckland to Fiji race which started on Saturday at noon.

She is now sailing in winds of 22kts and making 20kts of boat speed having left Auckland almost 24 hours ago.

Winds were light for the early stages of the race, with the boats being shown as being down to speed of 4kts in the middle of the first night.

The TP52, V5 (David Nathan) is the lead monohull with Equilibrium (Graham Matthews) in third place. V5 is 981nm from the finish, as at 1100hrs on June 2, 2013

As the boats head north the winds are increasing, with V5 now sailing at 11kts in 13kts of breeze - still a lot less than TeamVodafoneSailing.

It is not known at this stage as to the situation with the record. The negative being the slow start, but on the positive side the boats are all very close to the Great Circle route (the shortest distance between Auckland and Fiji), and the breeze seems to be good on a fast angle.

To the east and north there are stronger winds from a tropical depression, however this is expected to skirt the fleet, and they will head to the west to avoid the worst of it.

At this stage of the race the boats would normally head east looking for the SE Trades, to get a slingshot ride into Fiji on the final days of the race. The depression, if it moves through quickly could be a real bonus for the fleet, through being able to stay close to the GC route for the whole race.

Race tracking can be followed on the link from the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron homepage www.rnzys.org.nz