Longest final straight ever for VOR fleet

by Lizzie Green on 18 Jan 2006 As movistar (Bouwe Bekking) gets back into the groove today the leading three yachts in the Volvo Ocean Race have 20 knots on the nose, forcing them to sail upwind. This weather will probably continue for the foreseeable future, possibly all the way to Melbourne.

The rough seas in the Great Australian Bight will also have to be overcome. Simon Fisher onboard ABN AMRO ONE (Sebastien Josse) described the feelings onboard yesterday, It now feels like we are on the final straight now though, we merely have to straddle just over one thousand miles of Australian Bight.

It doesn't matter how much we try and trivialize it, it is probably going to be a few of the hardest days in this leg. Possibly the longest final straight ever!! Right now we are crashing upwind in a nasty chop - this is going to continue for the foreseeable future making Melbourne seem like a lifetime away still.

Movistar, ABN AMRO TWO and ABN AMRO ONE (Mike Sanderson) tactics are all very similar. Last night saw them all tack within two hours of each other, heading out offshore again, to zig zag up the south coast of Australia.

Movistar is still only 124 nautical miles behind second placed ABN AMRO TWO, despite their short stop yesterday in Albany, Australia. Bouwe expressed his thanks and relief early this morning, We were in continuous contact with race headquarters, so they could verify the spot we had taken to suspend racing. As soon as confirmation came in, the fight against the clock started. If you make a pit stop, you know that it is for a minimum of two hours, before you can start again. The other boats keep racing, so the clock is counting in lost miles.

From there on in everything went quickly, the boat with spares was at the rendezvous point, and quickly all the equipment was transferred, using the local rescue rubber boat. From that point on movistar was like a bee's nest filled with shore crew, film crews, photographers and plenty of activity.

2.5 hours later the ram was fixed and we were up running again. A huge thank you to Elly, Fred, Britty, Wado (our shore crew heroes) and the crews on MV Stackpool, and the local Albany rescue boat, the whole operation went flawlessly.

Back on Brasil 1 (Torben Grael) things are still looking bright for the team as they reach the halfway stage and still have a smile on their faces. Bowman Andy Meiklejohn certainly shows he hasn’t left his sense of humour in South Africa, I have been assured by Marcel van Trieste that the future is currently in the past, something like the movie with Michael J Fox, with some luck the lightning has already struck and the weather will allow us a fast ride from here to Eclipse Island. Tomorrow is looking good with some building north westerlies, plenty of slamming and bouncing with frequent deck washes thrown in. Roll on Melbourne and a cold beer!

This afternoon Paul Cayard and his Pirates have informed the race office that they have made repairs to the yacht and they plan to leave Albany within the hour.

Cayard said, It will that the Black Pearl one more hour to reach the point at which she suspended racing yesterday. From that point in time, she will be racing toward Melbourne.

Today has been a very busy day in Albany fabricating and fitting new parts. The Pirates would like to give a special thanks to Paul Terry, Ray Woonings of Wallace Engineering and his entire team, and Eleanor Hay of movistar who helped us get sorted out with accommodation when we arrived late last night.

LEG TWO DAY 16, 17.01.06, 1600 GMT POSITION REPORT
YACHT LAT LONG DTF SMG 24 Hour Run 24 Hour Speed DTL DTLC SGPTS LPTS TLPTS RPTD ETA OVERALL

1 ABN1 37 39.43S 124 30.29E 01003 15.0 278 11.6 00000 +00000 7 7.0 14.0 29.0 20/01/06 16:06:__ 1

2 ABN2 37 13.33S 123 56.79E 01034 13.6 255 10.6 00031 -00006 6 6.0 12.0 24.0 20/01/06 18:48:__ 2

3 MOVI 37 02.63S 122 00.56E 01127 10.3 212 08.8 00124 -00018 4.5 5.0 9.5 15.5 21/01/06 03:04:__ 3

4 POTC 35 01.90S 117 53.16E 01352 00.0 006 00.3 00349 -00074 4.5 4.0 8.5 13.5 22/01/06 00:26:__ 5

5 AUS1 41 10.96S 108 56.53E 01903 12.0 324 13.5 00900 -00009 1.5 3.0 4.5 9.5 24/01/06 14:31:__ 7

6 BRA1 40 23.27S 084 03.17E 02973 18.2 340 14.2 01970 +00035 1 2.0 3.0 15.5 29/01/06 11:04:__ 3

7 ERIC 33 57.56S 025 37.90E - - - - - - - - - - - -

ABN1 ABN AMRO ONE
ABN2 ABN AMRO TWO
AUS1 ING Real Estate Brunel
BRA1 Brasil 1
ERIC Ericsson Racing Team
MOVI movistar
POTC Pirates of the Caribbean

DTF: distance to finish, SMG: Speed made good, DTL: distance to leader,
DTLC: distance to leader change; the difference between the distance from the boat to the leader taken at the time of the last six hour poll, and the distance from the boat to the leader at the previous poll

SGPTS: points scored at scoring gates on this leg to date
LPTS: projected leg points
TLPTS: projected overall leg points including actual points from scoring gates
RPTD: projected overall points including actual points from scoring gates
OVERALL: projected position in race overall if yacht maintains current position

The Volvo Ocean Race

- The Volvo Ocean Race is a round the world yacht race featuring nine offshore legs, over 31,250 nautical miles. The 2005-06 features an inshore race at each of the main stopover ports.

- Four teams from the last race measured the media value of their exposure. The results showed an average of US$50 million, which equates to a 200-300% return on their sponsorship investment.

- The Volvo Ocean Race 2001-02 achieved a cumulative audience of over 800 million viewers ranking it among the top international sporting events.

- Further information can be found at www.volvooceanrace.org .