DAY 59 - Club Med Finally in the Wind, pulls away from Innovation Explorer. Team Adventure and Warta Polpharma Get Worst of Pacific on Approach to Cape Horn. Team Legato Loses Satcom B.
News - Tuesday, 02/27/2001, 1:11 PM GMT

Position	02/27/2001 1:11 PM GMT
1st	Club Med (1750 nm from finish. Finally in the wind, heading for Canaries, avg speed 21.0 knots)
2nd	Innovation Explorer (902 nm from the leader. Soon to catch the same depression as Club Med, avg speed 13.1 knots)
3rd	Team Adventure (5973 nm from leader. En route for Cape Horn, in extremely rough seas, sailing on triple reefed main only, avg speed 18.4 knots)
4th	Warta Polpharma (6391 nm from the leader. en route for Cape Horn, in extremely rough seas, suffering more due to her size, avg speed 12.0 knots)
5th	Team Legato (8471 nm from the leader. Hunting for wind, has finally picked up speed, avg speed 8.0 knots)
6th	PlayStation DNF

cat-alist Estimated arrival dates and Positions
1st	Club Med	around March 3rd (Saturday)
2nd	Innovation Explorer	around March 5th (Monday)
3rd	Team Adventure	around March 18th
4th	Warta Polpharma	around March 21st
5th	Team Legato	around March 30th

Club Med, 'the Untouchables' - Finally In the Wind
Dalton: "We've been sailing really slowly for the past 24 hours. This wind hasn't filled in as quickly as expected. But when it does we'll be gone. We've been heading north to get to the wind rather than sailing the course to Gibraltar, so our rate of approach to the finish has dropped. We had no wind all night."

Jacques Caraes: "We touched the first effects of the depression a good three hours ago. We're not yet on a direct route but it won't be long. The wind for the moment is southerly, then it will gradually turn south-westerly."

Gilles Chiori from Météo Consult: "This low is moving very slowly at about ten knots. This means that they will be going faster than it, and they will be able to get maximum benefit from it. They will first of all put in a little northing to avoid a small area of high pressure then they will curve round onto the direct route. It might even accompany them as far as Gibraltar and even then on into the Mediterranean ..."

So it looks like Saturday is still a go for the finish.

Innovation Explorer have to cross that extended ridge of high pressure. They have lost ground today. Yesterday they had managed to work their way up to 640 miles behind Club Med, then Club Med caught the wind and were able to take back some of the distance.

Roger Nilson, navigator: "I have never seen a low pressure this low as the trades. I think Club Med will finish with this low, we think we’ll get into it, but I don’t think we will finish with it."

What will the team do after the finish in Marseille?

• Loick Peyron: have a salad and rush home to his wife and 4 children, that he calls 'the microbes'. He will be able to rest for 20 days before his trimararan Fujifilm goes into the water to start the circuit in May.
• Skip Novak: has been fantasizing about an espresso coffee, a decent meal and sleep in a hotel. Then a real change of environment in the snow of the mountains.
• Yves Loday: 'the first thing is to see Liz' (his wife)
• Julien Cressant, bowman: to have some intimate moments with Stephanie. He has been offered a job both on the next Volvo Round-the-World Race and on the next French America's Cup team.
• Jerome Teigne, cameraman: to hug Annie and Clement. He is dying to see his 13-month-old boy walk. He is already confirmed for filming projects during the sailing Grand Prix and is working on a possible documentary in India.
• Thierry Douillard, crewman: a night of restful sleep with no boat noises, to see his girlfriend, family and relatives. His boat Figaro goes into the water in 3 weeks, so training must start.

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

Approaching Cape Horn - Southern Ocean not as kind
Team Adventure and Warta Polpharma have been getting a hammering from the Southern Ocean. They are close to the centre of a vicious low pressure system, their northern approach to avoid the centre did not help.

Team Adventure, Entertainment Extreme - this is no joke
Larry Rosenfeld, co-navigator: "The wind is above 60 knots in the squalls now, we have waves the size of big condos and growing ... Cam Lewis and the other drivers need to really pay attention, keeping the boat downwind, but not so far as to jibe. Even though our cat tracks well, the waves push the boat around a lot, making steering challenging. Down below you can hear when the rudders stall by the very loud sucking sound as the air destroys the flow over the rudders and the helmsman loses steerageway."

Lewis: "This current low we are sailing in is packing a punch, and the one behind it is carrying a double punch. With some luck, in eight hours or so the wind will get down to 30 knots and we can launch the storm jib. It's a bouncing, bucking, bronco ride sailing in darn impressive conditions. The Roaring Forties lived up to its name, and now the howling fifties and screaming sixties are kicking in to give us a real taste of why we need to get on down the road and out of here fast."

Those Fabulous Poles - conditions harder on a smaller boat
Jarek Kaczorowski: "Everything is sodden ... Our sleeping bags are as damp inside as outside and you have to be extremely tired to sleep in them. It's impossible to dry them because it is constantly raining and mountains of salt water wash over the decks. The waves are eight to ten metres tall at the moment! Over the last 40 hours, the wind has been around 30 and 45 knots and to makes things worse, a 50-60 knot wind is on the way from the south-west. We are about 5 days from Cape Horn. We hope that this will be the last strong gale in the Pacific. We're exhausted!"

"Out of bad luck we broke two mainsail slides yesterday, we have mended them temporarily but to repair them properly we need several hours and no waves. And right now it would really be a luxury to have such conditions."

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

Team Legato - 'the Survivor's' - hunting for wind
Bullimore: "We're just waiting on wind. It's a bit heart-rendering but there's nothing we can do. According to our weather router, we'd be better off going northeast, to keep on the right side of what weather is coming. As you know, we haven't got any models (computer weather) as our Satcom B is down, but I think we're in the middle of a high and we're waiting for some wind."

Robbie Burns, shore router: "Our plan is to stay on an ENE course that will take the boat around the top of a low just ahead of them. The alternative was to continue SE in favourable winds that will rapidly back in 18 hours time to 45 knot headwinds and big seas. Although they have slowed down on this new course they will at least make it to fresher winds around a big high to the East tomorrow. With 6 crew on board it's not the best plan to stuff them into gale force headwinds and damage them or the boat. It's pretty exposed down there and I have an upper wind limit I am trying to keep them out of - hence the change in plan. The plan has to remain fluid as the weather systems don't conform exactly to the long-range forecasts".

Map images courtesy of Virtual Spectator, click here to go to The Race site for a free download of the software.

Club Med in blue Innovation Explorer is in green Warta Polpharma is yellow

Team Adventure is in orange Team Legato is in brick-red PlayStation is in orange-red

Map images courtesy of Virtual Spectator, click here to go to The Race site for a free download of the software.

Club Med in blue Innovation Explorer is in green Warta Polpharma is yellow

Team Adventure is in orange Team Legato is in brick-red PlayStation is in orange-red

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