The Ocean Race: The route around the world and the scoring mode
The route
The first leg is a 1,900 nautical mile sprint from Alicante to Cape Verde. It is the first time that the race has stopped on the African continent. Until now, the fleet has always sailed past the islands as it travelled south down the Atlantic.
Stage 2 starts on 25 January and leads across the equator to Cape Town. It will be the 12th time the race has stopped at the southern tip of Africa, making Cape Town the most visited stopover of the event. This will also be the first of three so-called haul-out stops, where the boats may be lifted out of the water for maintenance.
Next up is a record-breaking leg - the longest race distance in the event's 50-year history - a month-long marathon of 12,750 nautical miles to Itajaí, Brazil. On this leg, the Imoca sailors will enter the Roaring Forties and Furious Fifties of the Southern Ocean. Antarctica is to starboard, and the fleet has to pass all three major southern capes - the Cape of Good Hope, Cape Leeuwin and Cape Horn - for the first time without stopping.
There will be another extended stopover in Itajaí, Brazil, before the race continues north, through the doldrums, across the equator and up to Newport, Rhode Island, on the east coast of the United States.
From there, the race returns to Europe, with a transatlantic leg to Aarhus, Denmark, followed by a flyby in Kiel en route to a stopover in The Hague, Netherlands.
This is followed by the last offshore leg - the grand finale - to Genoa, Italy.
The rating
The scoring for the Ocean Race is simple: the team with the most points wins. Stage winners receive five points, as many as there are yachts taking part, runners-up one point less and so on. Two legs are scored twice: On the Queen's leg from Cape Town to Itajaí, points are awarded once when crossing longitude 143° East and once at the finish. The Transat stage from Newport to Aarhus is doubled in the final result.
The harbour races form a separate competition; they are not included in the Ocean Race classification.
The Ocean Race VO65 Sprint Cup with many young sailors has its own classification based on the three legs sailed. Details on classes and classification can be found in the latest version of the "Notice of Race" on the homepage.
