Technology revolutionises Offshore coverage, Volvo heads to Finnistere

by Rob Kothe and the Sail-World team on 8 Jun 2015 Technology continues to advance, look at this amazing mid-ocean drone shot from Dongfeng, of Eric Peron aloft repairing a spreader tear.

Up to now helicopters have been needed for aerial shots. The use of drones is going to revolutionise coverage of all kinds of racing, whether its regattas or long ocean races, well outside helicopter range.

Looking forward to 2017-2018 Volvo Ocean Race CEO Knut Frostad is expecting to see faster drones, able to be deployed when boats are in breezes of 20+ knots.

Right now landing a drone is difficult in the turbulent flow from the sails. So more powerful drones will be needed to overcome that issue and they are in the pipeline.

Frostad expects that OBR's for the 2017-18 race are going to have much long training periods and you can see that a lot of that time will be spent with drones.

The Volvo Ocean Race Inside Track program is setting a new standard for offshore racing coverage, it’s certainly lifting the bar. Here is this afternoon's program



The Volvo Ocean Race has been testing the next generation of Inmarsat satellite domes and by 2017-2018 bandwidth will be even better.

High quality vision from the boats will enable exciting programs being produced two or three times a day, served to world-wide audiences via the Internet. That means even better value for sponsors.

Frostad says the shared services from the Boatyard run by Nick Bice will see boats with shore crews of just three, allowing for much reduced campaign costs, down to 12 million euros and that increases the number of potential sponsors exponentially.

He expects to see the first new one design VOR-65 entering the build phase in autumn 2015 and he is confident that nine boats will be on the 2017 start line in Alicante.

Right now Team SCA is leading the VOR fleet towards Cape Finnistere, the sentinel at the bottom of the Bay of Biscay, already SCA is seeing the swells coming from the north, ahead there will be winds of 30 knots gusting into the 40's.

Second behind SCA is Chris Nicholson and Team Vestas Wind, they have been playing snakes and ladders, at the back and front of the fleet in the last 24 hours, but we expect to see a good showing from Nico across the Bay of Biscay.

It’s going to be one of the most exciting legs of the race so far with the fleet expected to arrive in Lorient on Wednesday. Right now Dongfeng is at the back of the fleet but Brunel is ahead of overall race leader Abu Dhabi Racing. Using Ian Walker's phrase, there is plenty of golf left in this hole.