Team Malizia is back in the Mediterranean Sea and fighting neck and neck

by Team Malizia 24 Jun 2023 02:18 AEST

Team Malizia is back in the Mediterranean Sea - The Ocean Race © Antoine Auriol / Team Malizia

Five months after having left the Mediterranean Sea at the beginning of The Ocean Race, Boris Herrmann's Team Malizia has made it back through the Strait of Gibraltar and is closely competing with the other two IMOCAs in the last leg of the round-the-world race.

"Nico [Lunven] and I said that if we cross the Strait of Gibraltar with only 50 nautical miles to the lead, we are still in the running", commented skipper Boris Herrmann from onboard Malizia - Seaexplorer on day 6 of the seventh and final leg of The Ocean Race towards Genova. "We are only 5 nautical miles behind, so we are really happy with how we have caught up!" As the IMOCA race yachts passed through Gibraltar in what has been the slowest leg of the race, there was a big compression of the fleet.

Skipper Boris Herrmann in the cockpit of Malizia - Seaexplorer - The Ocean Race - photo © Antoine Auriol / Team Malizia

Now, the three boats are really even regardless of their position on the tracker, fighting neck and neck. Last night, Team Malizia seemed to be able to sail much higher angles for a period of several hours in their slightly more north position from Biotherm and Team Holcim-PRB and this really helped to get them right back in touch with the leaders as they all tacked back onto starboard in the early hours of this morning.

The fleet will be sailing upwind into the Mediterranean Sea for the next 24 hours or so in up to about 20 knots of wind. It is nice for them to finally have some breeze but it will really be VMG upwind so still not fast sailing, and with the boats so close together they will be in sight at times. The sailors on all the boats will be fighting for every little bit of speed and height in these conditions as the gains are small and hard to get in these upwind conditions.

The weather models are not totally in sync though with the GFS (Global Forecast System, the American model) road probably being the safest option because it stays along the coast, which allows you to have some consistency with the sea breeze. It is risky to stay without wind to the south of the Balearic Islands, however, sometimes fortune favours the brave and we never really know in the Mediterranean Sea!

Co-skippers Will Harris and Nico Lunven figuring out the best strategy in Leg 7 of The Ocean Race - photo © Antoine Auriol / Team Malizia

The first two tacks look the same on both routings: upwind and you have to play with a left and right shift. Sometimes it prefers to keep on one side to avoid crossing twice against the current but navigator Nico Lunven will no doubt be aware of this and will play with it.

As the fleet approaches Ibiza, there won't be any time to stop for a party. The wind will get very light again and then both the GFS and ECMWF (European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecast) models show a band of southerly wind to take them north between the Balearic Islands and mainland Spain tomorrow night and into Sunday morning. There is another fight for them through some light wind as they come across the top of the Balearics before hopefully they finally get into some actual fast sailing.

Malizia - Seaexplorer sailing towards Genova - The Ocean Race - photo © Antoine Auriol / Team Malizia

Monday day, they should cross the Gulf of Lion in 15-18 knots of NW wind so a nice downwind reaching angle that should give them some fast foiling but it is short lived! Technical Advisor Jesse Naimark-Rowse commented: "As soon as they get south of Toulon, it looks like the breeze turns off again and for the moment it seems the last 150 nautical miles to Genova will be a slog in light variable wind. The routing shows something between 36 and 48 hours to cover these last 150 nautical miles or so - it is still anyone's race to win and we can probably expect a close finish in Genova!"

Both ECMWF and GFS models currently show arrivals into Genova on the 28th of June.

Team Malizia's A Race We Must Win - Climate Action Now! mission is only possible due to the strong and long-lasting commitment from its seven main partners: Hapag-Lloyd, Schütz, the Yacht Club de Monaco, EFG International, Zurich Group Germany, Kuehne+Nagel, and MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company. These partners band behind Team Malizia to support its campaign, each of them working towards projects in their own field to innovate around climate solutions.