Hugo Boss banks her lead

Back sees her lead diminish in the Barcelona World Race

Yesterday afternoon, Hugo Boss had increased her lead to a substantial 50 miles in the Barcelona World Race. Sadly Alex Thomson and Pepe Ribes' sleighride south came to a halt when at around 1730 UTC they were forced to gybe else they run into the coast of Western Sahara. Heading southwest on the new gybe caused the Anglo-Spanish duo to converge with the trio of boats that had got their westing in early (having passed through, rather than around, the Canary Islands) - GAES Centros Auditivos, Neutrogena and Cheminees Poujoulat and shortly after midnight, the Hugo Boss crew gybed back on to port immediately ahead of their 5 West team mates on Neutrogena.

The move, which has effectively 'banked' their advantage now they are back covering the fleet, caused their lead to disappear, back down to 11 miles over second placed Neutrogena at 0500, which has somehow (according to the official figures), risen back up 25 miles by 0900 (Hugo Boss may be fast, but is not that fast).

Positions at 0900 UTC

Image below (click to enlarge) courtesy of Expedition and Predictwind

The lead four are all currently making good progress in the northeasterly Trades with boat speeds in the 17-19 knot vicinity. However all are still too close to the African coast and will contemplating when to put in a gybe back to the southwest.

Coming up fast are the Cape Verde islands, around 550 miles down the track from Hugo Boss at the 0900 sched. These present a similar problem to the Canaries in that they are mountainous and therefore present a considerable lee on their southwest side. As a result the usual tactic is to avoid sailing between the islands, although their lure is usually too great and races such as the VOR and Transat Jacques Vabre we regularly see boats passing through them. At some point the boats also have to get west in order to line up for the optimum Doldrums crossing.

Behind Hugo Boss, there is now a close three-way fight for second and respect in particular should be given to Anna Corbella and Gerard Marin on GAES Centros Audivitos, who far from being 'also rans' are mixing it with the race favourites. Up until the 1900 UTC sched yesterday the Barcelona World Race's only mixed crew was holding second place, although they have this morning dropped to third, five miles astern of Neutrogena in terms of DTF.