Volvo Ocean Race - Team Brunel wins leg 2 start

by Team Brunel on 20 Nov 2014 Team Brunel has set out on the second leg of the Volvo Ocean Race 2014-15 from Cape Town tonight. The 6125 mile (11,343 km) route will take the seven racing yachts via the Cape of Good Hope, Madagascar and the Indian Ocean to Abu Dhabi. After sailing two show rounds for the spectators, Team Brunel headed out onto the Southern Ocean in first place, while CEO of the Brunel secondment agency, Jan Arie van Barneveld, leapt from the Dutch racing yacht into the water.

Skipper Bouwe Bekking is expecting it to be an unpredictable leg, without regular weather patterns. 'You can easily fall back from first place to last, or vice versa,' said Bouwe Bekking in Cape Town. 'My navigator Andrew Cape and I have agreed that we won't be taking any risks. Later on in the race, I'm sure there will be teams willing to take more of a risk, which can soon increase the distance between the teams.'

'The atmosphere is good in our team. The crew we're sailing with is the same as the first leg, all we've done is adapt the rotation of the watch system. We think the team will perform even better now. Our aim is to end up on the podium again.'

Bouwe refuses to be influenced by the threat of piracy. 'The Volvo Ocean Race organisation has classified the route as being safe so far. There were three attacks within 100 miles of Somalia in 2014. Our route takes us more than 1000 kilometres away from Somalia to Abu Dhabi however, so there's very little risk.'

The yachtsmen must once again pass the equator in order to reach Abu Dhabi. Just like on the Atlantic Ocean, a strong wind blows anticlockwise under the equator on the Indian Ocean. These are the so-called trade winds. These two large wind paths meet at the equator, and form a region where very erratic weather patterns can be experienced. The wind comes from all directions and varies in terms of strength. At times, there may even be no wind at all. This area is officially known as the Intertropical Convergence Zone, but it is better known as the Doldrums. 'Passing through the Doldrums is the main challenge in this leg,' says Andrew Cape. The main difference when compared with the Atlantic Ocean is that the Indian Ocean Doldrums are much large and wider. The weather conditions are also much more extreme than during the first leg. We'll be sailing under Tropical conditions from Madagascar to the finish in Abu Dhabi. The humidity is one hundred percent, the water temperature is thirty degrees or more and the air temperature can run up to at least thirty-five degrees.'

Team Brunel will be dealing with a 30-knot wind from the south-east this evening. 'In order to reach the westerly trade wind, we need to sail windward to the south east for the first night,' Andrew Cape continues. 'Not long after that, we'll encounter the so-called Agulhas current. This current flows southward along the coast of South Africa and transports enormous volumes of warm tropical water from the tropics to the colder regions in the south. Massive waves can be formed when wind waves collide with such a strong current. At the same time, an area of very high pressure blocks our route north. In three of four days, we will need to decide exactly when to head north.'

Besides all these complex weather systems, there are a few more challenges facing us. 'The island of Madagascar is in the way, there is always a risk of pirates, albeit it minimal, and we know we'll encounter many small, unlit fishing boats,' Gerd-Jan Poortman adds.

'It was an amazing experience to jump from such a yacht at that speed,' says Jan Arie van Barneveld, grinning from ear to ear after his leap from the Team Brunel boat. 'The racing start of the leg was insanely exciting. The yachts were all so close together and the wind was blowing amazingly hard at one point. It's at times like that, that you realise just how hard the crew is working. And it's fantastic to see how calm Bouwe and the lads remain under conditions which can only be described as extreme. Even when the wind dipped momentarily and the yachts were sailing really close together, he stayed so cool. We were really moving. Bouwe didn't let off the speed at all when it was time for me to jump. Hitting the water wasn't as bad as I expected it would be. The dry suit certainly worked'.

The yachts are expected to reach Abu Dhabi sometime around 15 December. The twelfth edition of the former Whitbread Round the World Race counts ten legs and one so-called 24-hour pit stop in Scheveningen. The fleet of seven VO65 yachts will finish the race in the Swedish city of Gothenburg at the end of July, after having covered around 38,739 nautical miles (68,500 kilometres). Team Brunel website