On Saturday, the five boats coming from Abu Dhabi will (once again) be craned off the freighter to join Team Sanya somewhere in the Indian Ocean before the second start of the third leg. Sanya has reached the undisclosed and unnamed location for safety reasons after repairing the ailing rig and hopes to see the finish line for the first time in this race. The sponsor, the tourist region of Sanya, would certainly not be unhappy about this.
In between lie 3000 gruelling miles, which can be casually divided into three sections. The first 1000 miles lead through the monsoon region to the northern tip of Sumatra. The key section will be the up to 200-mile wind shadow of Sri Lanka. "Thunderstorms, variable winds and lots of sail changes," stated Gonzalo Infante, the VOR meteorologist.
Preview of the 2nd part of the 3rd stage
The next section is a 500-mile slalom between huge freighters and tankers and small, often unlit fishing boats through the Strait of Malacca. The VOR sailors have to sail along a relatively narrow corridor and align themselves with five course markers in order to stay out of trouble. Light winds but sometimes strong currents could force one or other team to anchor in an emergency. "Very tricky," Infante calls this scenario. "If you're not careful, you can lose a lot here." He also warns of a lack of sleep because the lookout will probably have to be reinforced in this section due to the high traffic density.
After that, the left turn will take us up towards Vietnam and on into the South China Sea to our destination in the seaside resort of Sanya on Hainan. With the expected north-easterly winds, the boats will mainly have to tack upwind, which they do not particularly like, especially in short, steep waves, as is usual in these shallow waters. This also caused the most breakage in the last race. "A week on the cross with steep waves of four to five metres," was Infante's forecast. The fun should last a whole two weeks, which would mean the finish in Sanya at the beginning of February.
Intermediate standings in the overall standings:
1st Team Telefonica 71
2nd Camper with Emirates Team New Zealand 64
3. Groupama sailing team 51
4. Puma Ocean Racing powered by Berg 36
5. Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing 31
6th Team Sanya 4 (will only start in the 2nd part of the third leg)
More on the Event page and about the Live stream the YouTube channel and the apps for I-Phone and Android.
Current positions and distances in the Live tracker.
