Former winners take the lead

Josephine Lemmel reports from day three of the Archipelago Raid through the Swedish and Finnish islands

The boats are speeding up in the archipelago of Aland today. In 18 knots of wind the small catamarans are doing around 10 knots of boat speed and enjoying the beautiful sailing in these remote areas. In the Archipelago of Aland the navigation is very difficult and all the teams are unfamiliar with the area. Treacherous waters with a lot of rocks and less detailed sea charts make it a grueling challenge for the competitors. You have to be really concentrated to sail efficiently, navigate between all the rocks and keep focus on the goal.

Magnus Woxén (SWE) and Rodney Ardern (NZ) on Sogeti won yesterday’s leg a couple of minutes ahead of the Swedes Fredrik Adilstam and Pontus Johansson on Addicom 1, who are still leading the race in total. Seconds later the British team William Sunnucks and Mark Self on X-Leisure reached the leg finish before the French Formula-18 pros Eric Proust and Yann Andrillon on Proust Sailing. The foreign teams are not overwhelmed by paddling and lost some miles in the light evening breeze.

All 28 boats were present at the start line for the third leg at sunrise at 04.30 this morning. With the wind in their backs they set off over the open stretch of Alands Hav towards the first checkpoint in Rodhamn in the archipelago of Aland. Good tactics were required across the ocean as the boats had to gybe several times to reach their goal.

The Frenchmen Eric Proust and Yann Andrillon ( Proust Sailing) are clever tacticians and were first to cross the open stretch and therefore won the first checkpoint of the day at around 08.30 this morning, only seconds before X-Leisure from England (William Sunnucks and Mark Self). Both third and fourth into Rodhamn were French boats, which even was the case at the second checkpoint today at midday. The Brits on X-Leisure were first to pass the second checkpoint before the French mafia of three teams. Compared to many of the Swedish teams the foreign competitors have chosen a trickier and more risky route in these difficult waters, but they have sailed smart, kept away from treacherous rocks and are gaining miles.

Quite a few of the boats have at least once during the race touched ground, more or less seriously. The daggerboards can easily be damaged, which was the case for one of the world’s fastest sailors, former PlayStation boat captain David Scully (USA), and the only female sailor of the race, Claire Bailey (GB), on Twinwire, this morning. They hit a rock after the re-start and had to spend the compulsory one hour stop in Rodhamn (first checkpoint of the day) repairing their daggerboards. Hopefully the damage is not too bad, as the competitors are out in wild nature a long way from civilisation. Twinwire was 15th boat to pass the next checkpoint.

Leg number three finishes tonight at the island Lappo, in the remote north-eastern part of the archipelago of Aland, on the boarder to Finland. Looking at the current positions of the boats we will most probably see some changes in the results. The result is based on a point system determined by the arrival position after each leg, plus 0,5 points in bonus for the first boat at each checkpoint.

The next leg is from Lappo back to the archipelago of Stockholm to Sandhamn, with six to eight checkpoints to pass on the way.

The race finishes in Gustavsberg/Stockholm Friday afternoon on 13 August.


Position of 10 first boats after Leg 2 plus two checkpoints of Leg 3

(There are five legs with around 6 checkpoints at each leg. The results are based on a point system determined by the arrival position of each leg, plus 0,5 points for the first boat at each checkpoint.)

1 Addicom 1 (SWE) 62.5p
2 Team X-Leisure (GB) 60.5p
3 Sogeti (SWE) 60p
4 Frugo (POL) 52p
5 Proust Sailing (FRA) 49.5p
6 PAF (FI) 47p
7 Jobman Workwear (ÅL/SWE) 46p
7 Ocean Works (SWE) 46p
9 GB Glace (SWE) 44p
10 Bollé (FRA) 43p