Sunday, March 20, 2011

CONTRAST 36

Boat: CONTRAST 36

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News:

Club Med stretches out the lead


Author: Club Med Media

The big blue Club Med catamaran has been stretching its lead on the second and third placed boats in The Race. Cam Lewis's Team Adventure trailed Club Med by more than 120 miles at noon today. The pair are sailing generally South Southeast almost exactly midway between Mar Del Plata on the
Argentinean coast and Cape Town in South Africa. An upbeat Grant Dalton had this to say this morning: "This is the break I wanted, we've played it well to get this chance and we are very satisfied with the result. It all started a couple of days ago when he (Team Adventure) turned to the East before we did. I wanted the South like nothing I've ever wanted before. We crossed
over his path and took up position to the South of him, and that is when our situation became the dominant one. He'll get to a point where he just can't get any further South relative to us."

Club Med has shown herself to be a quicker boat when the winds are light. This has given the crew the luxury of being able to position their boat where they want to be. Dalton's comments on boatspeed: "We have had a lot of Code Zero weather in the last few days. I don't think we are slow with this sail, we are definitely competitive in the lighter stuff with it. We can go upwind and downwind with it in the light. It goes through all conditions except the lumpy stuff." But it is not all about speed, tactics and strategy are playing a big part too. Just last night the crew decided to gybe again onto starboard to re-position themselves further South relative to Team
Adventure. Dalton and navigator Mike Quilter's plan to be the furthest South possible seems to have paid off as they are now in a position to collect the stronger winds from the back of the first depression the fleet will experience in the South. Dalton's comments this morning were: "Its still
quite light here and we are desperately struggling to catch the train that is the back of a depression several hundred miles ahead. It hasn't pulled out yet but if we get it we are off."

Since then Club Med has indeed caught onto some more breeze, ahead of the opposition. The blue Ollier-designed catamaran was sailing at 22 knots straight down the track with Team Adventure sailing at just half that speed more than 120 miles back at the latest position report. Getting into this first weather system in the South is really important as this lead will stretch dramatically over the coming days setting Club Med up well for the coming weeks in the Southern Ocean. As for third placed Innovation Explorer, situated more than 230 miles further back and sailing at just seven knots, Grant Dalton had this to say: "Loick will miss the train. They
are destined to wallow around in the High Pressure centres for a while longer."

The warm and sunny South Atlantic is now over for the leading boat. The weather will start to turn cold and windy and the crew must now face several weeks of appalling living conditions, with constant humidity, cold, noise, stress and violent motion to deal with. Manoeuvring and maintenance on the boat will be increasingly difficult. Dalton chose his crew so as to have the best mixture of good multihull sailors along with good Southern Ocean hands. The multihull sailors have done their part well and now the experienced Southern Ocean Whitbread veterans will start to play their part in keeping the boat in one piece. Dalton was full of praise for his crew this morning knowing what they were all about to sail into: "The Club Med crew are ingenious. They are right on schedule with our extensive maintenance programme. They have just finished everything before the weather
gets significant again. They are really good at finding solutions to problems at sea. They are just constantly talking about solutions and working them out."

Positions: ­ 11H00 GMT



Mйtйo Consult's weather forecast:

More Information:

  • YachtsandYachting.com The Race Information Page

See also: CONTRAST 33 for sale