DAY 13 - Team Adventure Closes the Gap
News - Friday, 01/12/2001, 5:55 AM GMT

Position	01/12/2001 5:55 AM GMT
1st	Club Med (in danger of losing lead, avg speed 22.5 knots)
2nd	Team Adventure (24 nm from the leader. Poised to strike for lead, avg speed 23.7 knots)
3rd	Innovation Explorer (247 nm from the leader. Slight gains on leaders, avg speed 19.9 knots)
4th	PlayStation (700 nm from the leader. Stuck in light winds, avg speed 9.9 knots)
5th	Warta Polpharma (1002 nm from leader. Gained speed but lost ground, avg speed 11.2 knots)
6th	Team Legato (2349 nm from the leader. Passed Canaries en route to Cape Verde, avg speed 13.5 knots)

The leaders have managed to bypass the St. Helana High and are in the easterly tradewinds. The southeasterly trade winds are propelling the leaders toward great speeds, which could continue over the next 24 hours. Team Adventure has halved the distance between herself and Club Med.

According to Gilles Chiorri of Météo Consult, the St. Helene high-pressure system isn't well established in the South Atlantic. There are two bubbles of high pressure to the east and west, and a tiny opening in between. Club Med and Team Adventure are aiming for this small opening. Innovation Explorer may be able to get there in time to take advantage of the gap. However it will not last, so the followers will hit the high. This will cause a greater gap between the two fleets. The boats that manage to make it through this window will then be able to pick up the low pressure systems of the Southern Ocean ahead of the competition and come out several days in front of the others.

Nearing the bottom of the Saint Helena High is when boats start to cut the corner and turn towards southeast to enter the Southern Ocean.

On Innovation Explorer, Roger Nilson, navigator feels they went too far west. They may have covered more distance, but spent less time in the Doldrums. They may have dropped slightly today, but that is because they were in different weather, with slightly lighter winds.

PlayStation has lost alot of ground because she is crossing the Doldrums. Early this morning, navigator Stan Honey talked about the weather conditions: "We are in the midst of the ITCZ now, at Lat 3 South. We have had only one squall over 30 knots; the rest of our trials have been with light and shifty air and the calms associated with the rain cells."

PlayStations navigator Stan Honey: "Nick's ankle is mending. I am working on the other Nick's hand at the moment. It has an ugly little staph infection going, but is responding to antibiotics. I have not been able to go after him with my little cleaver, yet!"

From the NOW live tracker, www.now.com

Innovation Explorer is in turqoise Club Med in yellow Team Adventure is green

PlayStation is in red Warta is orange Team Legato is blue

Showing Warta Polpharma, following a similar track to PlayStation.

From the NOW live tracker, www.now.com

Showing Team Legato has passed through the Canaries and pushing on to the Azores, following the track of Club Med very closely.

Tony added "We had two small problems with the mast yesterday. One winch broke down and the main halyard had its outer cover ripped badly when running through the rope clutch but, Olivier Cusin proved himself a top class rigger and quickly repaired the damage.

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