Stamm way out in front in Velux 5 Oceans

by Event media on 30 Jan 2007 By tomorrow, day 16 of the VELUX 5 OCEAN's second leg, Bernard Stamm and his Open 60 Cheminees Poujoulat could be leading second placed Kojiro Shiraishi's Spirit of Yukoh by more than 1,000 miles, an incredible achievement by the Swiss skipper, winner of leg one and outright winner of this race four years ago.

Just over the course of today Stamm has been average around 14 knots - fast, but not exceptional for an Open 60 - on the direct course to the next ice waygate, the western end of which is still 800 miles away. In comparison poor Koji has been stuggling, making just 5-8 knots average. As predicted this morning the high pressure has run over the Japanese skipper who now, after all his hard work at the weekend finds himself on the wrong side of the system in northerly breeze and with a large unavoidable expanse of no wind ahead of him. Fortunately for Koji the system is forecast to remove itself to the north over the course of tonight, leaving him in building westerlies to propel him the 130 or so miles (mid-afternoon today) directly towards the western end of the first ice waygate at 52degS 160degW.

A few days ago Bernard Stamm in an interview mentioned that there was no need for him to push his boat as his most serious competition in British skipper Alex Thomson and Mike Golding, were forced to retire on leg one. It seems Bernard is unable to sail his boat slowly. 'Since the English skippers are not racing anymore, I have less pressure. I have more time to look after the boat and really have no problems to report on board.' He has now managed to track down and fix the obscure problem he was experiencing with one of Cheminees Poujoulat's autopilot and has been and is still running on his spare.

As the conditions at present Bernard said 'I have the wind coming from the east side of the low pressure system. It is unstable. A lot of squalls, a few thunderstorms, a bit of hail. With 20 to 25 knots of wind the conditions are quite good to drive the boat.' The swell had become more regular, roughly 2-3m from the south.

Race Director David Adams says that yesterday evening Stamm's rounded the imaginary eastern end of the first ice waygate of this leg within 50m. 'I congratulate him on a very good rounding.'

After a slow-mo version of a Ferrari Formula 1 pit change, Graham Dalton was due to rejoin the race at 16:00GMT this afternoon after his discreet 48 hour stopover in Bluff. Aside from replacing around 100lt of diesel and about one third of his food, Dalton has also had to fix the leak in A Southern Man-AGD's diesel tank that caused the problem in the first place. When Dalton pulled into Bluff he was uncertain whether the leak was coming from the tank's breather pipe, or somewhere from the top of the tank or whether it had somehow split.

After threatening to sail to the south of the Auckland Islands, to the south of New Zealand, Unai Basurko has gybed and opted to stay to their north, probably due to the area of low pressure immediately to the south of the island at present. In the process Sir Robin Knox-Johnston on board Saga Insurance has managed to close the gap between the two boats to 50 miles. Both boats are currently to the north of the islands.

The question is - now that Graham Dalton has rejoined the race will be be able to regain his third place or will be in last place? Dalton position in Bluff was still to the east of the tailenders, but some 225 miles to the north. At present all the boats in this region are enjoying favourable westerlies, although they are weaker for Dalton to the north. However in the early hours tomorrow morning (UTC) there will be a rapid backing of the wind to the north with the onset of the next Southern Ocean depression. While intense (976mb at its centre at the moment) it is not moving very quickly and its centre is due to roll over Campbell Island due south of New Zealand and a mark of the course in around 52 hours time according to the latest forecast. The slow speed of this system should enable the tailenders to remain in favourable northerlies, good for reaching for at least two days.