11th Hour Racing Team: It's Now or Never

11th Hour Racing Team leaving the dock for Leg 5 of The Ocean Race © Harry KH / 11th Hour Racing / The Ocean Race

With just one point separating the top three teams in The Ocean Race, the levels of intensity are rising. This double points leg across the Atlantic is going to be critical to the overall success of the team at the finish in Genoa.

It's looking anything but easy.

"The Atlantic is the Southern Ocean in disguise," says 11th Hour Racing Team Strategist Marcel Van Triest, as he sits down in the team's base in Newport early on race day morning. "This is not a simple leg, especially the North Atlantic. It's a hostile environment at the best of times - the kind of place where you go from shorts and a t-shirt to neoprene gloves in half an hour. In fact, speaking of neoprene gloves, we've just rushed to put them onboard."

There is anything but certainty at the top of The Ocean Race leaderboard right now, and the pressure of a double points leg, with no scoring gate (unlike Leg 3), means the winner will take it all at the finish line in Aarhus, Denmark.

The Ocean Race 2022-23 - 21 May 2023. In-Port race in Newport - photo © Sailing Energy / The Ocean Race

Team Holcim - PRB sits at the top of the leaderboard (19 points), followed by 11th Hour Racing Team (18 points) and Team Malizia (18 points) tied in second. Statistically, all four boats, including Biotherm, could win the race. To date, the teams have completed 24,800 nautical miles (45,930 miles / 28,539 kilometers), which represents 79.2% of the total distance of the route, but only 55.6% of the points have been distributed. The points up for grabs in Leg 5 will account for 22% of the overall points.

Now that's a lot of numbers to digest, but it does set the tone for the intensity of this transatlantic leg. "Believe me when I tell you, this leg isn't over until it's over," says Marcel. "I remember back in Alicante, I sat down with Charlie and said, 'Charlie, this is your race to lose'. Then we sat together again last night, and I said, 'Charlie, this is now your race to win.'

The challenges of this leg range from everything from lobster pots on the exit to Narragansett Bay to notorious North Atlantic storms, negotiating the exclusion zones to a permanent mental state of heightened competition, given the scoreboard.