Volvo Ocean Race: Waiting for the first breakout

This morning, all seven boats sailed almost exactly the same course of around 118 degrees with wind from starboard and a speed of around 22 knots. They benefited from a south-westerly current, which sometimes resulted in an additional two knots over the ground.

The first five boats were within just eight nautical miles of each other, with only Vestas Wind and SCA appearing to have lost a little more ground at 19 and 30 nautical miles respectively. But these figures from the race tracker are somewhat deceptive. This is because the boats are currently sailing away from the finish, moving further and further away from the orthodrome (shortest route to the finish, white line in the diagram) in order to benefit from the strong winds in the south for as long as possible.

Only when the teams jibe to head north towards the Doldrums will the information on the distances become more meaningful. But when to gybe will be the most difficult next decision. Because although the gybe leads back to the shortest route, it also leads almost immediately into weaker winds. It will be very interesting to see how the individual navigators decide.

Meanwhile, the spectacular start off Cape Town echoes in the reports from on board. Among others, Matt Knighton, reporter for Abu Dhabi, explains his team's decision to start with one more reef than everyone else:

"It's not easy going into another 25-day leg, especially when you're the last boat on the course and see the back of everyone else. Still, Ian (skipper) was more than happy to have sailed such a nasty start so conservatively that nothing broke. 'Nobody talked about the start in Alicante in Cape Town,' said Ian. 'We knew the start was almost irrelevant, so we decided to back up our gear and cruise around the course. We saw Mapfre and SCA jibe into their backstays and I wouldn't have been surprised if they had broken their mainsail battens. Vestas probably damaged their genoa 2.'"

In fact, the mainsail was damaged, which is why Team Vestas had to briefly salvage the mainsail for the necessary repairs in order to apply adhesive reinforcements.

You can find the current distances and dates here...