BT Global Challenge - Leg 1 - 20th September

Mark Chisnell introduces another report from madforsailing.com's diary writer, Andy Magrath

The BT Global Challenge fleet has now been out in the North Atlantic for the last ten days, and there has been very little of that time when LG FLATRON hasn't been challenging for the lead. On the morning of the 20th September they were 33 miles ahead of second placed Quadstone, with 1360 nm to the finish of the first leg in Boston. The race for second is tight, with Logica, BP, VERITAS, Spirit of Hong Kong, Isle of Man and Compaq all within 40 nm of Quadstone.

The north-to-south spread in the fleet is tightening rapidly - down to 90 nm - as the fleet converge on the Grand Banks, south of Newfoundland, with LG FLATRON nicely positioned ahead of the middle of the fleet. They are beating in a solid north-west to westerly breeze, that's set up between an area of high pressure to their south (the one they have been so concerned to avoid parking in) and low pressure to the north.
The next change looks to be another low pressure system sweeping in from the west overnight on Thursday. That's not the hurricane Andy refers to below (which I cannot see being a problem for them - actually, to be completely honest, I can't even find it on the weather charts I've got), but it does look like the fleet will get a decent gale.

They will run out of the westerly breeze as they get south of the Grand Banks and have to endure another light spot before the breeze fills again from the south. That should make for some fast reaching conditions, before the cold front associated with this low pressure goes through and swings the wind to the west and north-west again. As any buoy racer will know, wind shifts count most at the corners, and anyone who finds their tactics constrained by their proximity to the Grand Banks could take a loss. The end of this week could be interesting.

Andy Magrath is one of our two diarists aboard the BT Global Challenge race leader, LG FLATRON, and he sent this report in yesterday.

Andy Magrath, LG FLATRON Tuesday, 19th September, 2000.

Our strategy paid off - we sailed through the area of high pressure first and came out first! But we are not counting our chickens as yet. There is still a long way to go and sailing being the sport that it is, much could happen! We are now on a course of 270 and heading for the Grand Banks then Boston. Nothing on the yacht is taken for granted, we trim day and night and no sail change is left not done, everyone on the boat tries their hardest and we keep pushing on, hoping that by the next position update we have extended our lead.

Hurricane Gordon is potentially our next hurdle. It is travelling north-east and may roll over the top of the high pressure and into the path of most of the yachts in the race. The latest weather fax from Boston did not indicate that it would be a problem, but as always we are watching the weather closely. When we set out across the North Atlantic we were all expecting a strong blow which hasn't as yet materialised - maybe this could be it!