Volvo Ocean Race: Spoilt for choice: Auckland direct or diversions via Fiji?

As they approach the island states of the Solomon Islands, the teams in the Volvo Ocean Race are facing perhaps the most important decision on this sixth leg totalling a good 6000 nautical miles: Ahead of them on course for Auckland, roughly abeam the Solomon Islands, lies an extremely wide belt of doldrums that blocks the direct southerly course to Auckland. Only much further east - at the level of the Fiji Islands - does the narrowing squid belt promise a potentially much faster passage. However, the diversions via Fiji would mean hundreds of additional nautical miles if we deviated from the direct southern course to Auckland. What to do?

With the doldrums poker already underway, the navigators and their crews have been racking their brains for days, studying the weather models with great intensity. On Sunday night, the leaders from AkzoNobel were stopped by a huge cloud and had to let David Witt's team Sun Hung Kai / Scallywag pass them. Scenarios like this will be repeated in the coming days and the positions of the boats will be shaken up again and again. Witt's team is currently leading ahead of AkzoNobel (6.1 nautical miles behind), Team Brunel (124.9 nautical miles), Dee Caffari's Team Turn the Tide on Plastic (154.1 nautical miles), Charles Caudrelier's Dongfeng Race Team (187 nautical miles) and the Spanish Team Mapfre (194.3 nautical miles).

Team Brunel's skipper Bouwe Bekking calls the current scenario the "harmonica effect": because the frontrunners Sun Hung Kai / Scallywag and Akzo Nobel have reached the light wind zone first, the chasing teams have the chance to catch up. But Bekking also knows what question is on the minds of all the teams: Will there be - and if so, then where exactly - a quick passage opportunity through the calm zone?

Even the specialists on land are not in agreement. The race organisers' team of experts reported early on Sunday morning: "The weather models result in a variety of extremely different routes." There are up to 600 nautical miles difference between the proposed courses - direct or via the east diversions - which is around 10 per cent of the total course length and does not seem very tempting at first glance. The coming days will show how the teams decide. It would not be surprising if one or the other team were to make use of their right, permitted once per leg, and switch to stealth mode for 24 hours in order to conceal their decision from the competition.

Here we already had a glimpse of the forthcoming decision scenario: in the doldrums poker game at the equator, the teams have to find the fastest course through the squid belt - hard work for the navigators!