Volvo Ocean Race: Can a cloud be good or evil?

"Can a cloud be inherently good or evil? Do clouds have feelings?" Dongfeng's Anbord reporter Sam Greenfield asked himself and others in the battle to win the stage. As a photographer and filmmaker, he loves the massive and sometimes gloomy structures in the sky and describes them as a "lucky lottery ticket", but at the same time knows: "Sailors hate them." And that is hardly surprising. On Thursday, one such cloud wiped out Dongfeng's two-nautical-mile lead, which had been built up over several days, within 30 minutes. The red boat almost came to a halt, while Abu Dhabi's rivals were able to whiz past in sight at speeds of up to 17 or 18 knots. In this way, the cloud spoilt Charles Caudrelier's 41st birthday, which had started with the lead and ended with the race to catch up all over again. "If the guys on Azzam sang 'Happy Birthday' when overtaking, at least we didn't hear it," Greenfield noted with a touch of gallows humour.

One day before the finish of the fourth leg from Sanya to Auckland, everything seems to be set for a furious finale in front of the skyline of the "City of Sails": on Friday morning, four nautical miles separated Abu Dhabi's leading "Azzam" from the Chinese-French Dongfeng crew, which was coming on strong again. And the Spanish team Mapfre had also worked its way back within striking distance of Abu Dhabi in the shadow of the top duel, just 4.7 nautical miles behind. At the same time, with only around 180 nautical miles to go to the finish, Team Alvimedica's hopes of reaching for a podium place faded - the US team still had 32.1 nautical miles to make up on the top boat on the penultimate day. For their final sprint, the teams are expecting light and unsettled winds and a breathless three-way battle on the way to Auckland.

Team Brunel and Team SCA can no longer intervene. While the last place in the fleet is no surprise for the women's team flying the Swedish flag, the sailors in the Dutch team have to fight frustration and anger at themselves. They had led the stage for several days after an ingenious tactical move, before losing out on a possible stage win with another solo effort. The men around skipper Bouwe Bekking and navigator Andrew Cape are now more than 100 nautical miles behind and probably have no chance of making a decisive improvement in the stage classification. This means that this fourth of a total of nine race legs marks a serious setback for the winners of the second leg in their bid to win the twelfth edition of the Volvo Ocean Race. If they remain in fifth place - their second in a row - Team Brunel would be able to maintain third place in the overall standings, but the gap to the two leading boats from Abu Dhabi and Dongfeng would widen.