Mandrake wins keen award

Lindsay Lyons reports as the VinaCapital Hong Kong to Vietnam Race gets underway

All 13 competitors were on the line for the start of the 2006 VinaCapital Hong Kong to Vietnam Race, which started on schedule at 1200hrs today, watched by the race sponsors and friends and family of the competitors.

12 to 14 knots of North Easterly breeze was unfortunately not enough to blow away the heavy pall of pollution hanging over Hong Kong at the time, but it did help the boats to the windward mark, then off downwind on the 656nm slide to Nha Trang in Vietnam.

Farr-Mills 51 Mandrake, owned by Fred Kinmonth and Nick Burns, probably claimed the best start, although no-one seemed in too much of a rush to get over the line. By the windward mark, Paul Winkelmann's TP52 Island Fling was heading the fleet, with Sam Chan's TP52 Free Fire 52 and Neil Pryde's Farr 52 Hi Fi hot on his transom. Mandrake was not far behind, and will be keen to make a bid for the IRC Division A title on corrected time.

Conditions are forecast to strengthen considerably once the boats get out of Hong Kong waters, with Force 5-6 mooted for the first night at sea. As an Offshore Category 1 race, the boats are well prepared, however novice Vietnamese sailors Minh Le on Shahtoosh and Tri Nguyen on Drumstick may find the conditions heavy going!

Benoit Lesaffre's multihull, Atmosphere, should find conditions ideal for a line honours bid, although whether she can challenge Skandia's record of 42h 45m 41s remains to be seen. The slower boats of IRC Division B have been forecast strengthening winds for the latter half of the trip, so Quest, Polar Star III and Barnstormer will be looking forward to reaching their destination before Prizegiving on Sunday night. Premier Cruising will also benefit when the stronger breeze kicks in, with Marcel Leidts' Hocux Pocux 2 competing against Peter Cremers' Shahtoosh and Geoff Hill's HSBC Strewth, helmed this time by George Snow of Brindabella fame.

Progress of the race can be followed via the event website, http://www.hkvietnamrace.com, thanks to tracking technology provided by Pole Star and SkyWave, who have joined forces to provide a web based tracking facility for the event.

SkyWave has supplied all participating boats with one of their DMR 200 units and Pole Star, utilising their Purplefinder technology, will provide the satellite (Inmarsat) based positional data from each boat, which will be updated every two hours during the race.