Skandia and partners get behind Moloney

by Offshore Challenges on 30 May 2004 Twenty years ago, Skandia pioneered MultiManager investment within long-term savings products - and they are now bringing the same pioneering spirit to their sponsorship of Australian Nick Moloney.

Supporting the Skandia MultiManager campaign are three of Skandia's leading international fund management partners - Invesco Perpetual, Gartmore Investment Managers and Merrill Lynch Investment Managers.

If early forecasts prove correct, Nick Moloney and Skandia will sail directly into the path of a North Atlantic low pressure when The Transat race gets underway on Monday, 31st May in Plymouth UK bound for the United States.

The Transat fleet could face winds 30 plus knots and difficult seas when they leave the sanctuary of the English Channel and enter the North Atlantic ocean. Despite the tough weather predictions Moloney, originally from Victoria, is upbeat and declared himself 100% ready to go today. ‘I'm totally prepared and really happy with Skandia - she is a glam,’ he said from Plymouth.

‘I'm so impressed with how everything has come together for this race. My shore team; John Hilderbrand, Marcus Ashley-Jones, Nick Black, have done a first-class job preparing Skandia.’

With all the supplies onboard and all systems double checked early, Moloney has been able to spend time studying weather charts provided by Météo France. Winds of 25-30 knots are expected for Monday's start off Plymouth breakwater, but as soon as the fleet clear the Lizard (at the south-west tip of England) on the first night, conditions could get worse.

‘The biggest problem is a large depression in the mid-Atlantic,’ explained Nick. ‘It's slowed up and deepening and is sending a huge seaway towards the English Channel. As we pass over the continental shelf we're expecting some big wind from the north-west and a huge seaway. It's a recipe for a hiding.'

‘In light of that, we're not deterred as our preparation has been really good and I know the boat really well,’ he continued.

Adding jokingly: ‘That doesn't mean I'm looking forward to getting soaking wet, freezing cold and thrown around for four days!’

This will be Moloney's fourteenth Atlantic crossing and in two of the three solo races - the 1999 Mini-Transat and the 2002 Route du Rhum - he has encountered gale force head winds in the opening 48 hours. ‘I'm starting to think it's me,’ he quipped.

Icebergs are another hazard Nick could face. ‘The ice lies in the path of the shortest [rhumb line] course,’ he explained, looking ahead to the second-half of the 2,800 nautical mile race.

Weighing up the option all skippers will face, he posed the question: ‘It is going to be better to sail a shorter course slower or longer course faster with less stress? There's also a chance you could get a good flogging from a storm in the ice region with heaps of obstacles in your way.’

The Open 60 fleet of 15 boats are skippered by some of solo sailing's heavyweights. Briton Mike Golding on Ecover and Frenchman Jean Pierre Dick on Virbac, two new and refined designs, are considered the joint favourites for Transat line honours.

Considering Skandia's potential for the Transat, Nick said: ‘ If I can make the top five I'll be really happy and if I can make the podium I'll be jumping out of my skin. It would be a dream result.’

Russian tennis beauty Anna Kournikova will fire the start gun for the Transat on Monday (May 31) at 1400 hrs GMT. Skandia is expected to finish in Boston between 13 and 15 days later.

For more information visit http://www.nickmoloney.com


* Nick Moloney is one of an impressive group of Skandia Set Sail athletes.

* Skandia Set Sail is a global sponsorship programme that aims to offer people more opportunities to participate in the sport on a broader level. The objectives of the Skandia Set Sail Campaign are to make sailing more accessible, grow the sport's reach and enrich peoples' lives through the sport. The Skandia Set Sail portfolio is divided into three groups; events, teams and athletes.

* The portfolio includes the title sponsorships of Skandia Cowes Week, the world's oldest and largest regatta on the Isle of Wight, UK (title sponsors for 10 years in 2004) and Skandia Geelong Week in Victoria, Australia - now twinned with Skandia Cowes Week; UK sailors Iain Percy and Steve Mitchell in their Athens Star campaign; Sam Davies, the up and coming single-handed yachtswoman and her Figaro campaign; Austrian 470 sailors, Sylvia Vogl and Carolina Flatscher; the Skandia Brown Cup, the Scottish Schools Sailing Championship; Skandia Cowes Youth Week, a leading international match racing championship, the Skandia Yachting Academy (in association with Kit Hobday's Bear of Britain) and the Skandia Maxi, Australia's biggest ocean racing yacht and line-honours winner of the 2003 Sydney-Hobart Race.

* Sail 4 Cancer is the official charity of the Skandia Set Sail programme.

* For further information contact www.skandiasetsail.com.