Volvo Ocean Race Leg 7 - Day 8

Rome Kirby taking a breather in his bunk onboard PUMA during leg 7 of the Volvo Ocean Race © Amory Ross / PUMA Ocean Racing / Volvo Ocean Race

Resurgent Abu Dhabi board express train to Lisbon

Abu Dhabi were building a big lead on Leg 7 of the Volvo Ocean Race on Sunday after beating the fleet to a low pressure system that packs the power to catapult them to within a couple of hundred miles of the finish.

The team skippered by Britain's twice Olympic silver medallist Ian Walker have been bolstered by the misfortune of their rivals, with overall race leaders Team Telefónica and second-placed Groupama sailing team stuck, struggling to find pace in a high pressure system in fifth and fourth respectively.

PUMA Ocean Racing powered by BERG remain second on Leg 7, trailing the leaders by 48 nautical miles, while CAMPER are third, 60 nm behind. Both are in prime position to take advantage of an upcoming ridge that is expected to compress the fleet.

Meanwhile, Team Sanya are revelling in a return to racing after missing two consecutive legs with damage. The team are well to the back of the fleet but have made the boldest move of all, taking a route north to within 50 nm of the ice exclusion zones in search of better breeze.

The trek north puts Mike Sanderson's team in a position to take advantage of a front that will come from the west, which Volvo meteorologist Gonzalo Infante said could see them gain decent pressure and wind shifts that could even edge them ahead of Telefónica and Groupama.

Infante said a ridge to the east of Abu Dhabi, along with the front that is coming from the west, would see the fleet compress over coming days. He said the boats further north were expected to fare best, meaning the possibility of more troubled times for Groupama and Telefónica, while giving CAMPER and PUMA a chance to catch up.

Despite the various pitfalls Walker said he was confident in his team's course, which had enabled them to race at a 24-hour average speed almost two knots quicker than their closest rivals.

"At the moment conditions look quite good for us to stretch a bit," Walker said. "We need to get as far as we can because I think we're going to need every mile to be honest.

"We've had a very good last few days. Jules has done a great job negotiating the Gulf Stream and that set us up to take us round the bottom of the high pressure, and I guess now we're getting the rewards for that.

"We should have good wind now until a couple of hundred miles out from Lisbon when we'll hit a brick wall."

Groupama skipper Franck Cammas is banking on the upcoming ridge putting a halt on the leaders' progress, in hope of keeping his team's winning chances alive.

The disappointed skipper put his team's current position down to a lack of luck and the play-it-safe tactical option to stick with the fleet.

"We didn't take the same option (as Sanya) because it was a 50/50 one and it's less risky to stay with the fleet,'' he said. "Now isn't the time to risk it all."

Cammas is pinning his comeback hopes on the front that will grip the fleet in coming days. "We hope that the front will reverse things, that the ones behind will come back,'' he said. "That's what I hope for and that's what you can see on the routing models. There is a good opportunity for us to hook it while the fleet will be compressed."

The fleet's Lisbon, Portugal ETA remains May 31.

Position Report at 13:00:51 UTC:

www.VolvoOceanRace.com

Blog from the Seas (by Amory Ross, MCM, PUMA Ocean Racing powered by BERG)

“So much for getting out of the high and the old ‘rich getting richer’ thing…” – Ken Read

LOCATION: 130 miles S of North Atlantic Ice Gate
WINDSPEED: 8.1 kts
BOATSPEED: 9.5 kts
DISTANCE TO FINISH: 1,800 miles

Getting a sunburn where we are now is probably a lot harder than yesterday made it seem, but when you spend the majority of the day laying on the bow – as we did – just about anything’s possible. Following a few busy days of upwind sailing, yesterday’s light air offered ample time to catch up on rest; drifting in the middle of a high-pressure system meant there was almost nothing to do but doze and dream. Michi, who after multiple wake-up attempts typically hops out of his bunk just a few minutes before he has to be on deck, had to be woken up to go off watch…and that was good for a solid laugh!

But really, as comfortable and pleasant as a warm mid-Atlantic day in the sun can be, it’s not what we want to be doing and it’s always hard sitting still for so long. Were it not for three knots of Gulf Stream current under the boat, yesterday might have been a complete write-off. We would no doubt vote unanimously: 24 hours and 500 miles of extreme discomfort is always better than 24 hours and 150 miles of book-reading bliss. We’re here to go fast and win a race, and it’s hard to do that in just four knots of wind.

The mind seems willing to put up with a certain amount of frustration if an end is in sight, and as we convened on the bow the topic of conversation mostly revolved around our escape – the first boat out of this high should have a massive head start – and whether our northerly position that we worked hard to get would soon pay its dividends. Everything pointed to a first night of fast sailing ahead, but as has been the case with much of this race, the weather isn’t cooperating and last night brought no breeze and only more frustration. It defies logic…sailing away from the high should produce stronger winds, but for the time being it’s only getting lighter.

Regardless, we’re here now and we’re committed to the north, and there’s really not much to do other than keep the old girl going as best we can. Eventually the high will move on and we’ll get to punch our ticket for the fast ride east towards Lisbon. We just hope it fills here first! As long as we get first dibs at post-high pressure, its belated arrival could mean nothing more than a delayed finish in Lisbon.

- Amory

On the road (from Groupama Sailing Team)

Though Groupama 4 is still managing to contain the attacks from the Spanish, the Emirati leader has benefited from the light winds of the high pressure system to make good her escape. However, everyone still has to climb up to around 43° North to latch onto a solid south-westerly breeze, which will very quickly propel the fleet towards the finish. Franck Cammas and his men are preparing for a rather boisterous start to the week!

It's overnight this Sunday that the fleet will finally be able to set a direct course towards Lisbon, after a four day climb from 33°N to 43°N! They will have some light to moderate breeze to negotiate, a zone of high pressure to avoid, the warm current of the Gulf Stream to manage, some changes of rhythm to deal with, some cooler temperatures to front up to and some repositioning to anticipate: this rather unusual phase across the North Atlantic has seen the Emirati boat shine. Indeed the crew of Abu Dhabi has sailed superbly well, in some weather conditions which have finally smiled on the Farr Design, and Ian Walker and his men have made a clean break with a lead of around forty miles over their American rival in second place.

Way out

Leading the race for the past 48 hours, this Sunday lunchtime Abu Dhabi was the first to extract herself from the light airs of the zone of high pressure positioned to the South-East of Newfoundland's Grand Bank. Basically they were already being influenced by some WNW'ly winds of around fifteen knots which kicked in with the arrival of a depression from Labrador, whilst the Franco-Spanish duo were still in the throes of a breeze barely drumming up six knots. As such, the separation between the boats has considerably increased and the phenomenon should extend still further until tonight. At sunset the situation will stabilise once the fleet has continued to climb up to the North-East to really get into the teeth of this new polar wind.

In this way, the frontrunners will be able to make good their escape in a breeze which will shift round to the South-West, but this fresh breeze will build behind and hence favour the chasing pack. With over twenty knots expected, the tempo promises to be very steady and this is due to last for three days! In fact the disturbed system will slip along at the same speed as the Volvo Ocean Race boats all the way to the Azores, at which point it will be revived by another pretty deep depression, it too dropping down from Labrador. As such we can expect some very high average speeds each day from Tuesday, in this powerful SSW'ly wind and the fleet are likely to trace a virtually straight wake across the Atlantic until Wednesday evening.

A ridge of high pressure to negotiate

Groupama 4 is unquestionably the most at ease in these boisterous reaching conditions and even though her delta in relation to the Emirati boat is likely to exceed a hundred miles tonight, the bulk of this should be recovered before the Atlantic archipelago. In any case, the fleet are set to stumble on a ridge of high pressure less than 400 miles from the finish in Lisbon. Indeed, given that the depression will remain very static in the middle of the ocean, the high pressure, which has (finally!) settled over Western Europe, will hinder progress.

A large zone between Ireland and Madeira will generate southerly wind to the West and northerly breezes on its continental aspect. Between the two, a zone of calms will need to be traversed… It's the entry into this ridge of high pressure, which will determine the best position to commit to this area of light airs. As a result, it's highly likely that nearly the whole fleet will end up within a few miles of each other just before the end of the leg! However, Franck Cammas and his men know that's it's always preferable to be in the position of leader when there's only one way out of a situation to complete the race. In any case, it's certainly the fastest phase of this circumnavigation of the globe, which is on the menu for the day after Pentecost…