Baltic bound

Volvo Ocean Race's leg eight sets sail from Galway tomorrow to Marstrand via the Channel

The seven-strong Volvo Ocean Race fleet is ready to race to Sweden, leaving behind a Galway stopover that has exceeded all expectations. With visitor numbers through the race village now nearing 350,000 and climbing to well over half a million when the crowds along the sea wall for the in-port race weekend are factored in, Galway has demonstrated genuine enthusiasm and passion for the race.

But, on Saturday at 1500 local time (1400 GMT), the teams will leave that behind, as they get underway in leg eight, a relatively short sprint up to Sweden. The race course will include an opening loop around Galway Bay, before the teams sail for open water and past the iconic Fastnet Rock, en route to the English Channel.

Once up the channel, the race takes the boats towards Rotterdam, where there will be a single loop around two marks laid off the port entrance, near the Hook of Holland. Local sailors there can test their speed on the same racetrack (although not at the same time), and compare themselves with the Volvo Open 70s.

From Rotterdam, it's up into the Baltic Sea and onwards to Marstrand for a short 'pit-stop' style stopover. Teams are restricted from their normal stopover activities in Marstrand and are not allowed, for example, to have outside assistance in working on the boats, nor are they permitted to add additional sails or other supplies before the restart for leg nine to Stockholm, where normal stopover rules apply.

Looking ahead to Saturday's start, the nearly unprecedented bright sunshine and warm temperatures that Galway has provided through much of the stopover are expected to be in short supply. In their place will be good racing conditions, with winds expected in the 15-knot range for much of the afternoon, under overcast skies and a much cooler temperature of 12deg.

Leg eight is the first of a series of closing legs that will feature inshore or near-shore racing, which calls for a different mindset according to Puma skipper Ken Read.

"This is back towards the type of sailing that a lot of us grew up doing," he said at the skippers' press conference in Galway today. "It’s a different mentality from the ocean race sailing we’ve been doing for the past few months. It’s about changing your mindset a little bit. Going around corners and tidal gates, plus there’s going to be a lot of variable weather. You could see a lot of lead changes and splits from the group. It should be interesting and nerve-wracking on board and quite different from what you’ve been watching recently and hopefully it will be entertaining."

Ian Walker, skipper of Green Dragon, is a man with a team that was in high demand during this stopover. As the local boat in the fleet, the Dragons were often the stars of the show in Ireland.

"We’ve had a fantastic stay here in Galway," Walker acknowledged. "But I think everyone has had a fantastic stay, all the teams have. So it will be with a bit of a heavy heart that we leave."

Green Dragon navigator Ian Moore added: “It has been a fantastic stopover, I think it has exceeded everyone’s expectations. We always thought it would be good for us because obviously home crowd and bringing the project back to Galway. But I think everyone has been over whelmed, all the teams have come to us and said it has been the biggest crowds they have seen before in the race, as well as great weather and just the reception from the local people has been phenomenal.”

His team will be working with the virtual game players again on this leg. Those registered to play the Volvo Ocean Race Game will be able to vote on tactical questions posed by Walker and his navigator Ian Moore. The answers come from the results of an online poll and are fed back through the entire fleet to ensure the Green Dragon team doesn't get any advantage from the information.

"What we’re trying to do with ‘bwin’ and United Games is to connect the game more directly to the race," Walker explained. "The players already use the same weather files we do, but on the boats we have different issues that the gamers don’t have to deal with, be it a broken sail, tide or human issues... Every 12 hours on the last leg, we discussed with the gamers what some of our problems were on board and sent in some questions. They did an online poll and then sent the answers back to us and the rest of the fleet... I think it was a lot of fun for us and for them, so we're going to do the same thing again."

As to leaving Galway, Ian Walker continued: “The whole team has had a fantastic stay, it is with a heavy heart we now have to leave. But it won’t be long until we sail back into Galway Bay, we are looking forward to doing this as soon as possible after we finish the race in Russia.

"I looked at the weather this morning, it is true you can cut the corner by going inside some islands, but I think the most likely scenario is that people will head further offshore to get the better conditions. The fleet has to pass inside the Fastnet Rock, which will probably be at night which is shame in terms of people being able to see what’s going on! Passing the Fastnet rock is great experience, it was a big goal to sail around and I remember my first time. It is an iconic landmark in yachting, just like Cape Horn, but only on a smaller scale! After that we will head for the English Channel and then onto the home of Ericsson!”

In the real race, the competition at the head of the fleet sees Ericsson 4 take to the water with an increasingly comfortable 13-point lead. Telefónica Blue is in second place, just one point ahead of Puma Ocean Racing. The fight for second is the closest battle on the racecourse.

"We're only one point apart but there are still quite a few points to go," said Telefónica Blue skipper Bouwe Bekking. "We'll try to keep a close eye on PUMA, but I think it's too early to start covering. Our main objective is to win the leg. Ericsson 4 may be very comfortable now, but there is still an outside chance that they may have a bad one and we have a real good one, so we'll just try to win the leg and we'll see then how Ericsson 4 and PUMA end up."

Ian Moore provides his forecast for the start: “It looks like a downwind start from Galway but the breeze is forecast to die away quickly after Fastnet rock and it could be a light air beat from the Rock to the Dover Straits. This is quite a contrast to yesterday's forecast which included much more down wind sailing. At the moment the routing is suggesting an ETA of over five days which could make for a very slow trip!”

Overall Leaderboard
1. Ericsson 4 (Torben Grael/BRA): 94.0 points
2. Telefónica Blue (Bouwe Bekking/NED): 81.0 points
3. PUMA (Ken Read/USA): 80.0 points
4. Ericsson 3 (Magnus Olsson/SWE): 62.5 points
5. Green Dragon (Ian Walker/GBR): 53.0 points
6. Telefónica Black (Fernando Echávarri/ESP): 39.0
7. Delta Lloyd (Roberto Bermudez/ESP): 31.0 points
8. Team Russia (Andreas Hanakamp/AUT): 10.5 points

Crew lists:

DELTA LLOYD
1. Roberto Bermúdez De Castro/ESP – skipper
2. Wouter Verbraak/NED – navigator
3. Sander Pluijm/NED – media crew member
4. Stuart Wilson/NZL – watch captain
5. Nick Bice/AUS – watch captain
6. Andre Fonseca/BRA – helmsman
7. Ben Costello/NZL – helmsman
8. Ed Van Lierde/NED – trimmer
9. David Pella/ESP – trimmer
10. Gerd-Jan Poortman/NED – bowman
11. Morgan White/AUS - bowman
No changes

ERICSSON 4
1. Torben Grael/BRA - skipper
2. Jules Salter/GBR - navigator
3. Guy Salter/GBR - MCM
4. Brad Jackson/NZL – watch captain
5. Stu Bannatyne/NZL – watch captain
6. Dave Endean/NZL - pitman
7. Horacio Carabelli/BRA - trimmer
8. Tony Mutter/NZL - trimmer
9. Joao Signorini/BRA - trimmer
10. Ryan Godfrey/AUS - bowman
11. Phil Jameson/NZL – bowman
No changes

ERICSSON 3
1. Magnus Olsson/SWE – skipper
2. Aksel Magdahl/NOR - navigator
3. Gustav Morin/SWE MCM
4. Thomas Johanson/FIN – helmsman/trimmer
5. Richard Mason/NZL - watch captain
6. Martin Strömberg/SWE – trimmer
7. Jens Dolmer/DEN - pitman
8. Anders Dahlsjö/SWE - bowman
9. Martin Krite/SWE - bowman
10. Magnus Woxén/SWE – trimmer
11. Arve Roaas/NOR – trimmer/helmsman
On: Magnus Woxén/SWE – trimmer
Off: Eivind Melleby/NOR - helmsman

GREEN DRAGON
1. Ian Walker/GBR - skipper
2. Ian Moore/IRL – navigator
3. Huang Jian CHN – MCM
4. Neal McDonald/GBR – watch captain
5. Damian Foxall/IRL – watch captain
6. Anthony Merrington/AUS – helmsman/trimmer
7. Phil Harmer/AUS – helmsman/trimmer
8. Andrew Mclean/NZL – pitman/trimmer
9. Justin Slattery/IRL – bowman
10. Freddy Shanks/GBR – bowman
11. James Carroll/IRL - trimmer
On:
James Carroll IRL – trimmer
Huang Jian CHN – MCM
Off:
Guo Chuan/CHN - MCM
Ian Budgen/GBR - helmsman

PUMA
1. Ken Read/USA - skipper
2. Andrew Cape/AUS - navigator
3. Rick Deppe/GBR MCM
4. Erle Williams/NZL – watch captain
5. Robert Greenhalgh/GBR – watch captain
6. Robert Salthouse/NZL – helmsman/trimmer
7. Justin Ferris/NZL – helmsman/trimmer
8. Shannon Falcone/ANT – bowman/pitman
9. Casey Smith/AUS – bowman/helmsman
10. Michael Müller/GER – helmsman/bowman
11. Craig Satterthwaite NZL – trimmer/driver
No changes

TELEFÓNICA BLUE
1. Bouwe Bekking/NED - skipper
2. Tom Addis/AUS – navigator
3. Gabriele Olivo/ITA – MCM
4. Iker Martinez/ESP - helmsman
5. Jonathan Swain/RSA – watch captain
6. Jordi Calafat ESP – helmsman
7. Xabier Fernandez/ESP - trimmer
8. Pablo Arrarte/ESP Spanish - trimmer
9. Laurent Pages/FRA – helmsman
10. Daryl Wislang/NZL - bowman
11. Pepe Ribes/ESP - bowman
No changes

TELEFÓNICA BLACK
1. Fernando Echávarri/ESP – skipper
2. Roger Nilson/SWE – navigator
3. Anton Paz/ESP – MCM
4. Antonio (Ñeti) Cuervas-Mons/ESP – bowman
5. Gonzalo Araujo/ESP – watch captain
6. Jaime Arbones/ESP – watch captain
7. Pablo Iglesias/ESP – helmsman
8. Javier de la Plaza/ESP – helmsman
9. David Vera/ESP - trimmer
10. Maciel Cicchetti/ARG – trimmer
11. Michael Pammenter/RSA - bowman
No changes