There will be no boredom on stage two of the Ocean Race. The battle for victory and the podium places on leg two continues unabated. The standings have changed several times in the past 24 hours. Only one thing is clear: Team Guyot's second attempt to break through in the east has not been successful. Skipper Robert Stanjek, navigator Sébastien Simon, Anne-Claire le Berre and Phillip Kasüske have had to join the tail end of the fleet that has rushed past. In the afternoon of the eleventh day at sea, the French-German quartet was 113 nautical miles behind the new leaders from Team 11th Hour Racing.
Team Malizia is the mileage winner of the last 24 hours
The burst large spinnaker also contributed to this new scenario. The break also slowed down Guyot Environnement - Team Europe. The situation on board "Malizia - Seaexplorer" is completely different. Skipper Will Harris, navigator Nico Lunven, Rosalin Kuiper and Yann Eliès are savouring the good feeling of having almost levelled the gap of more than 220 nautical miles on the western motorway to the south, which was so painful two days ago. The crew had hoped for this. Nevertheless, the giant leap forwards is impressive.
At the front of the field on Sunday afternoon, most of the Imocas' bowheads were focussed on South Africa. Even though the teams kept making small turns to the south to avoid further high pressure zones. The ocean race quartets chased towards Cape Town at impressive speeds of over 20 knots.
Almost bow to bow on course for Cape Town
On the afternoon of 5 February, Charlie Enright's US team 11th Hour Racing took the lead ahead of Kevin Escoffier's Team Holcim - PRB with Susann Beucke. The American leaders and the Swiss team with the French skipper were separated by a good 20 nautical miles. Behind them, "Malizia - Seaexplorer" had already moved up to third place and was only 30 nautical miles behind the Enright crew. A good six nautical miles behind them, Paul Meilhat's "Biotherm" crew were piling on the pressure. At the same time, Team Guyot's gap had grown to more than 100 nautical miles.
The race remains highly exciting because the fleet still has to circumnavigate an area of high pressure as it heads east. "We are sailing towards a high," stated Charlie Enright. He explained the upcoming and once again complex challenges as follows: "There is more rotation in the centre of the high, but slightly less pressure. We want the best of both worlds." The organisers and teams are currently expecting the fleet to arrive on leg two from Cape Verde to Cape Town on 12 February.
Ocean Race and Boris Herrmann fans will be treated to a TV portrait of the Hamburg circumnavigator on Sunday evening (5 February 2023) from 11.35 pm on Sportclub. In addition, the second episode of the Ocean Race documentary series "Malizians" entitled "Boris burnt" was released on 5 February.
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
