GAES takes the lead

Barcelona World Race fleet heads west to avoid the Cape Verdes

For the Barcelona World Race fleet, yesterday afternoon and overnight has been about getting westing in on starboard gybe. The first to flop back have been Anna Corbella and Gerard Marin on board GAES Centros Auditivos who, as a result, are now furthest south and have pulled into the lead at the 0900 sched.

Among the lead four, GAES was the first to gybe away from the African coast at around 1400 UTC yesterday. She was followed half an hour later by Hugo Boss and Neutrogena (think there might be a race within a race going on there?), while Cheminees Poujoulat left it until around 1730.

Sailing a little higher than the boats to the south, GAES gybed south at around 0100 this morning and has done well on port - according to the excellent Geovoile tracker she appears to have successfully crossed ahead of Cheminees Poujoulat at around 0600 this morning. If GAES continues on this course, then it will take her through the Cape Verde islands, some 220 miles down the course from her present position. It seems likely given that they have pressed on to the west that the other three will not gybe south until they can clear the Cape Verdes to port - this gybe will probably happen later this morning.

Positions at 0900

Image below courtesy of Expedition and Predictwind

As mentioned yesterday, the Cape Verdes are mountainous - its highest peak, Mount Fogo is 2,829m tall - so there is a strong argument of avoiding them altogether. But of equal importance is getting some westing in. The crews will already be examining the Doldrums crossing - at present at around 28/29°W this seems to be between 0-3°N. Then there is what 'phase' the St Helena high in the South Atlantic is in, and whether it will be one of those rare opportunities to 'cut the corner' avoiding the mile-sapping circuitous route around the high as Isabelle Autissier famously managed in the 1994 BOC Challenge. At present looking at the long term forecast, this doesn't look likely.

What is impressive is just how close this competition remains among the front runners, despite the variety of backgrounds of the four crews. Long may this last.