The German and Chilean match race heats up

(by Oliver Dewar) On the third day of racing, pole position in the Portimão Global Ocean Race double-handed fleet continues to change. While Felipe Cubillos and José Muñoz on Desafio Cabo de Hornos and the German duo of Boris Herrmann and Felix Oehme on Beluga Racer continue a display of offshore match racing and are consistently under one mile apart, the British duo of Jeremy Salvesen and David Thomson on Team Mowgli played the wild card and took a southern flyer early in the race.

“Our tactics have been to get a little south of the fleet but to stay north of the Chatham Islands,” reported Salvesen late on Sunday. “This tactic has had a similar result to the Cape Town start and appears to have cost us time against the rest of the fleet,” he continued. “However we are now gaining that ground back.” The gamble proved highly effective and while the Chileans and Germans fought it out at the front, Team Mowgli slipped into first place on Sunday night and held the lead until shortly after their Class 40 passed 35 miles to the north-east of the remote Chatham Islands on Monday morning.

The latest position poll at 1520 GMT (23/02/09) reveals that Salvesen and Thomson are still looking for  stronger breeze,  resisting the option of simply slip streaming the German and Chilean teams and Team Mowgli is heading north-east in third place, crossing the tracks of Beluga Racer and Desafio Cabo de Hornos. Currently, the British Class 40 is trailing the leading duo by 19 miles, averaging four knots. Meanwhile, Boris Herrman and Felix Oehme have squeezed into the lead on Beluga Racer less than a mile ahead of Cubillos and Muñoz on board Desafio Cabo de Hornos as the two boats stream south-east averaging six knots.

“The British boat is sailing a brilliant race,” admits Cubillos. “They made the decision to go south and went into the lead. Good work, Team Mowgli.” However, the luxury of wild card tactics is not available to the Chileans. “Our race is a very different matter, though,” he continues. “We made the decision well before the start that we would stick close to the Germans, covering Boris and Felix on Beluga Racer, ignoring any tempting weather or tactical options that may appear. I spoke with Boris before the start and I know that this is his strategy also. So here we are, the two boats separated by around 100 metres, match racing through the Southern Ocean.”

On Leg 1 and Leg 2, Beluga Racer and Desafio Cabo de Hornos finished each leg separated by under four hours after around 6,500 miles of racing with the German team taking first place. Consequently, Cubillos realises that the time to attack or break away from Beluga Racer may be thousands of miles in the future. “It’s like being a bird of prey or an animal hunting its quarry,” says the Chilean skipper. “Knowing when to strike is vital.”

Sailing within clear sight of each other allows the teams to monitor the opposition’s sail changes and both boats have been swapping from Code 5 to spinnaker in an attempt to gain an extra knot of boat speed with a total of six headsail changes in six hours. The close proximity also provides scope for entertainment between the Class 40 skippers.  “Over the radio we invited the Chileans to lunch,” reports Boris Herrmann from Beluga Racer. “However, we insisted that they contribute their national drink, Pisco, to the party and we promised to rustle up an apple strudel. Sadly, I don’t think the race rules permit luncheon parties and the rendezvous is postponed.”

The single-handed status of Michel Kleinjans on Roaring Forty allows the Belgian skipper spectator rights as he watches the three Class 40s fight it out to the south. “The Chileans had a flying start,” he observed this morning. “They’re really intent on winning this leg of the race as the route takes them passed their home country on the way to Brazil. They are really, really determined to reach Cape Horn first, although if this doesn’t provide extra motivation for Beluga Racer and Team Mowgli, I don’t know what will!” Meanwhile, Kleinjans is concentrating on getting back into solo ocean racing after the New Zealand stop over. “After the start, I opted to head east, in fact even slightly north of east, while the others dived south-east,” he explains. “My evaluation of the weather files showed less wind to the south, so I stuck north, but the wind evaporated for me and I dropped back quickly to 50 miles behind the double-handed fleet.”

This lack of stable wind meant constant sail changes to keep the Open 40 moving, robbing sleep from Kleinjans and preventing the Belgian skipper from achieving any offshore rhythm and rest pattern that is vital to a solo sailor. “It was hours before the next batch of weather files arrived and when I downloaded them, they showed more wind in the south!” Early on Sunday morning, Kleinjans gave up the northern option and turned Roaring Forty south-east: “Since then, I’ve been trying to get south and it now appears the others now have less wind than me.” The latest position report shows that Roaring Forty is now 29 miles behind Team Mowgli and maintaining contact with the double-handed fleet.