Walker’s crew remains the furthest west, with both PUMA and Ericsson 4 just out of sight 20 miles to the east. Fernando Echavarri’s Telefonica Black is nearly 80 miles further east, all on its own and at 0400 held the distinction of being the furthest south in the fleet. This could prove critical. The first boat to break free of the doldrums and escape into the trade winds could just sail away over the horizon.
PUMA and Telefonica Black are enjoying the highest wind speeds in the fleet. PUMA, with nearly 14 knots of breeze, has nearly double the wind of race leader Green Dragon.
Further to the east, Ericsson 3 and Telefonica Blue are sailing within sight of each other, dodging clouds in the Doldrums, as Bouwe Bekking explains.
“Rain in general is bad news, especially if you are in the wake of a cloud. We could see (on the radar) that the rain was about 16 miles away and you would expect that there is no impact over such a big distance. But we know better. Ericsson 3 had seen the same thing and we both tried to sail higher to avoid it as much as possible. But again, we both ran into the ‘wall’. FULLSTOP for two hours, sails flapping.”
But Telefonica Blue was able to pass the Swedish boat overnight and Bouwe’s team is now up to fifth on the leaderboard.
Team Russia and Delta Lloyd, the teams furthest to the east, are struggling the most. They have the lowest 24 hour speed and are now dropping a few miles with each position schedule. Unless they find something dramatic over the next 12 hours, it appears their Doldrums strategy will leave them in a disappointing position.
