Kirsten Neuschäfer and Pat Lawless are now rewarded for their decision to sail further south than the rest of the leading quintet, making rapid progress, while Simon Curwen, Tapio Lehtinen and Abhilash Tomy have to sail and cross further north.
Kirsten Neuschäfer has recently sailed the fastest times on her Cape George 36 and is making good progress. According to the tracker, she is currently in second place.
But it wasn't just the positioning in relation to the high pressure area in the South Atlantic that influenced the speed of the skippers over the last few days. Some took advantage of the calm conditions to clean the hull of heavy fouling. However, such an operation at sea seems hopeless for Guy Waites, whose hull is apparently so overgrown with pox and barnacles that he has set course for the South American coast in order to lift the boat out of the water and clean the hull.
Frenchman Damien Guillou and Austrian Michael Guggenberger are sailing in the midfield between the leading quintet and the rearguard on course for Cape Town. Organiser Don McIntyre reports that Guillou broke the shaft of his Hydrovane wind steering system due to modifications he made to the system before the start. 14 of the 16 participating yachts have a Hydrovane mounted on the stern - the Canadian manufacturer of wind steering systems is a partner and sponsor of the Golden Globe Race.
"Captain Gugg", as skipper Guggenberger is known in the GGR community, looks extremely satisfied in the first video compilation from on board his "Nuri", which has now been released. Guggenberger, who actually wanted to start at the last Golden Globe, is happy to have made it this far and meticulously documents his life on the high seas.
"I almost have the impression that I'm sailing here to make a documentary film," says Indian skipper Abhilash Tomy as he mounts his camera, which shows him cooking in the galley. Not all skippers heed the call from the race organisers to deliver gripping images from the sea. But some - like Guggenberger and Tomy - are committed to filming how they make radio contact with freighters or family, how their boats surf through the waves and how they try to keep their balance for a bit of personal hygiene from the bucket despite the rocking.
There could soon be more impressions from on board when the fleet makes its second scheduled stop off Cape Town. As was the case off Lanzarote, a GGR team will be waiting there to receive images and letters from on board. The Indian Ocean will then be a long, lonely marathon for the fleet of budding non-stop circumnavigators.
This might also interest you:
- Start at the beginning of September, all race info here
- Last Golden Globe sailor to finish after almost four years
- Lutz Kohne, the German member of the Golden Globe team
- A portrait of Rustler 36
- Golden Globe update: Sailors reach first media stop
- Golden Globe update: Three new videos from the high seas
- Golden Globe update: New break on board the "PRB"
