Sea, Sail & Surf newsAround Alone
Bernard Stamm 126 miles from Cape Town
mercredi 13 novembre 2002 –
This may mean a slightly later arrival than the ETA of 0900hrs local time, however, he will definitely not turn up any earlier. At the moment he crosses the line, Stamm will have completed the 6,880nm leg from Torbay, England to Cape Town, SA hopefully just under or indeed on the 30 day barrier - a remarkable time.
Stamm’s closest rival, veteran circumnavigator Thierry Dubois on Solidaires is clocking up the highest average speed at 14.59 knots, thanks to a better, wider sailing angle in the 20 knot Southerly breeze on the right side of the high, which has led to him eating a chunk of Stamm’s comfortable lead. Now the Frenchman is 164nm further back, and just a bit further North on a trajectory towards Cape Town.
Dubois is controlling his lead over third placed British skipper, 28yr old Emma Richards on Pindar and lies 70 miles ahead of her. A tactical decision last night not to use the gennaker and sail at a higher angle saw Emma lose more precious miles to her rival, but there is every chance she could still leap frog Dubois if the customary light airs are dominant just before the finish. After nearly 7,000 miles, their duel will be played out in the final approaches to Cape Town itself.
They must not turn a blind eye to Graham Dalton on rocket ship Hexagon, eating up the miles to go and now lying a further 170 miles back from Pindar, nevertheless potentially in a better position to to tackle the final miles to the line : "One of my great mottos in life is ’If you don’t give up you can never be beaten’ and Hexagon and I are still very much in the race. At the moment I am benefiting from being a lot further South than Thierry and Emma. I have terrific conditions and they are approaching, or have arrived in, an area of very little wind. Keep an eye open behind you guys, here comes the Kiwi and he has his foot to the floor !"
And finally Kojiro Shiraishi, Japanese skipper on Open 40 Spirit of yukoh and Canadian John Dennis on Open 50 Bayer Ascensia have both crossed the Equator this evening, John literally just sending in a message of confirmation at 12:33GMT "just crossed the line". For Kojiro’s fifth Equator crossing he wrote on a bell given to him by hosts in Newport, RI (USA), which holds great significance for him : "it feels good to be finally over the equator because in my mind Cape Town looks so much closer from this side of the Equator. An hour before crossing the equator suddenly a healthy wind picked up and Spirit of yukoh has since been going at a good speed. The waves are crashing on to my bow. The boat is heeling ?" Bermudian Alan Paris in Open 40 BTC Velocity is next to sail over the imaginary threshold.
The latest ETA’s (local time = GMT +2hrs) for the top 4 boats are as follows :
Bobst Group-Armor Lux - 9am local time Wednesday 13th November.
Solidaires - 2am local time Thursday 14th November
Pindar - 8am local time Thursday 14th November
Hexagon - 8pm local time Thursday 14th November
Positions at 2200hrs GMT 12th November 2002
Class 1
Boat Lat Lon AvgBsp AvgHeading DTF (nm)
1. Bobst Group Armor-Lux, 34 45.310 S, 16 07.160 E, 73.55 nm, 9.20 kt, 46 °T, 126.02 nm
2. Solidaires, 34 43.160 S, 12 39.120 E, 116.69 nm, 14.59 kt, 74 °T, 290.98 nm
3. Pindar, 34 28.120 S, 11 12.070 E, 108.05 nm, 13.52 kt, 90 °T, 360.79 nm
4. Hexagon, 35 44.070 S, 7 36.310 E, 113.14 nm, 14.14 kt, 74 °T, 544.65 nm
5. Ocean Planet, 15 08.450 S, 27 27.040 W, 88.39 nm, 11.04 kt, 194 °T, 3078.51 nm
6. Tiscali, 36 11.260 N, 13 14.450 W, 85.79 nm, 10.70 kt, 208 °T, 6309.39 nm
Class 2
Boat Lat Lon AvgBsp AvgHeading DTF (nm)
1. Tommy Hilfiger, 19 48.260 S, 30 04.520 W, 77.48 nm, 9.67 kt, 188 °T, 2830.85 nm
2. Spirit of Canada, 5 15.080 S, 28 08.720 W, 72.52 nm, 9.06 kt, 190 °T, 3673.11 nm
3. Everest Horizontal, 3 54.500 S, 28 09.280 W, 50.81 nm, 6.34 kt, 189 °T, 3753.63 nm
4. Spirit of yukoh, 1 05.360 S, 27 04.090 W, 55.57 nm, 6.94 kt, 194 °T, 3921.08 nm
5. Bayer Ascensia, 0 16.240 N, 27 30.240 W, 56.28 nm, 7.04 kt, 210 °T, 4002.97 nm
6. BTC Velocity, 0 52.283 N, 27 28.433 W, 36.41 nm, 4.55 kt, 215 °T, 4038.98 nm
Dans la même rubrique
Around Alone : Table Mountain on Bernard Stamm’s horizon today !
Around Alone : Under 500 nm to go for Bernard Stamm
Around Alone : Leader Bernard Stamm heads down to the fringes of the ’roaring forties’
Around Alone : Emma Richards spent 4 hours up her 80ft mast
