Volvo Ocean Race 2014-15 Leg one – South Atlantic tactics

by Henry Bomby on 27 Oct 2014 Volvo Ocean Race 2014-15 - So the fleet are around the little island archipelago of Fernando de Noronha, the last waypoint before arriving. Looking through the options ahead for all the teams, some potential short cuts, the traditional options and what to look out for on the tracker, as well as where the next potential passing lanes might be.

I have had a few questions asking why the teams didn't turn hard left at Fernando and head straight to Cape Town, so explaining this seems like a good place to start.

At the moment the teams are sailing in the South Easterly trade winds. Which would mean a dead beat all the way to Cape Town for the teams if they wanted to sail this more 'direct' route. This is Option 1 in the playbook. While it is the shortest distance to sail, it basically never works due to the Saint Helena High pressure system normally located off the West coast of South Africa. See Abu Dhabi's track if they took the northerly option (blue) below.

Option 2 (in pink) is the stock option, the traditional route, and has many alternatives and subtleties but is the option all the teams will be taking this time around. That is to head south in the SE'ly trades and hook into one of the low pressure systems rolling around the southern ocean, get to the Westerly winds to the South of it and then ride it all the way to Cape Town, ideally!

Now of course it will never be quite that easy! There will be a trough, ridge or other roadblocks along the way or a stalling or accelerating of the low pressure system that will cause the navigators to make minor or some major adjustments to their trajectory as they make their way south. And once they hook into LP1, they will then also be fighting to stay ahead of the front. This is all where it gets really interesting again for us.

So looking at Option 2 in more detail. What the teams will be looking to do as they head south is to time their arrival at LP1 to arrive on its Western side. They will then sail into its center, creating the nice gybe arc in the constant left shift (in a similar way that they all passed the High Pressure system at the Canaries), and then gybe back to re-position themselves on the southern side of the low as the wind shifts back to the right as LP1 makes its way east to Cape Town. Then the game is to hang with it as long as possible, and not get eaten up by the approaching cold front.

So what to be looking out for on the tracker at the moment?
Well the interesting thing here for us is how the teams set up east to west. Rather like as they set up east to west for crossing the doldrums, but this time they are lining up to take their ride (LP1) to Cape Town.

Vestas and Abu Dhabi are a good example of this differing of opinions. Vestas setting up to the West will be sailing more cracked, faster but be sailing more distance. This move suggests they are setting up for a later arrival of LP1. Abu Dhabi sailing further east, will be sailing more upwind, but also sailing shorter distance in total. They will be expecting LP1 to be advancing east more than Brunel and Vestas. However this is also the safer option for defending the teams behind, so maybe this is having an effect too.

It really is a difficult game for the navigators at the moment with forecasts to unreliable so do the perfect trajectory, but where they position themselves now will have a big effect later. If you sail to far east now, you could end up sailing VMG downwind to get to the Western side of the low, or worse end up sailing to the North of it, upwind. Sail to far West and you could miss LP1, get swallowed up by the cold front quicker and miss your ride to Cape Town..

So over the next few days keep an eye on the teams and their trajectories south. While straight line reaching might seem a bit boring on the tracker, it actually, on close observation is giving us some real insight to the teams' thinking on how they will be approaching this last 10-12 days of Leg one. As they close in on the moving target of LP1, and the forecasts become more accurate, they will all be fine tuning their trajectories. Changes of course means lost time however, so they will all be trying to use the wind shifts and increases and decreases in the breeze to do these changes as efficiently as possible.

Next time I will be looking at how the teams approach LP1 more specifically, once we have better and more accurate forecasts. With perhaps some predictions on who has positioned themselves the best to be able to stay ahead of the cold front the longest too!

Keep tracking and get in touch for any Event website