Cessna Citation shoots through the bluQube Scoring Gate

At around 04:30 GMT on Friday, Conrad Colman and Adrian Kuttel were the first Global Ocean Race (GOR) Class40 to cross the extended Leg 3 bluQube Scoring Gate, grabbing the maximum six points with Cessna Citation and immediately dropping deeper into the Pacific with 2,000 miles in the Furious Fifties ahead of the Kiwi-South African team until they reach the Felipe Cubillos Cape Horn Gate and exit the Southern Ocean.

In second place on Financial Crisis, the good news that Marco Nannini had been made Italian Sailor of The Year was balanced by the destruction of the Class40’s masthead spinnaker – a costly loss for Nannini and his Spanish co-skipper, Hugo Ramon. While the two southern boats are racing off the wind with south-westerly breeze from a low pressure system rolling east through the Southern Ocean below the Class40s, furthest north in third place, Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire on the GOR’s South African entry, Phesheya-Racing, are enduring variable headwinds and rough seas as they wait for the tail winds to arrive.

As Colman and Kuttel shot across the bluQube Scoring Gate averaging 13 knots on Cessna Citation, Marco Nannini and Hugo Ramon were 170 miles to the west making ten knots with Financial Crisis: “The last 48 hours have finally given us some following winds and faster sailing conditions,” confirmed a very relieved Marco Nannini. “This came as a huge relief, although sailing downwind at high speeds presents its own challenges too.” For the Italian-Spanish duo, a split second of pilot malfunction cost Financial Crisis their masthead spinnaker. “It was a problem similar to that already experienced by Phesheya a few days ago,” he explains. “The autopilot suddenly pushed the tillers to one side, enough to send the boat into a violent crash gybe and with mainsail and spinnaker on the wrong side the boat was pinned down, the spinnaker hard pressed against mast and rigging ripped in half before we even got to release it.”

With 2,000 miles of the Southern Ocean remaining and around 1,800 miles of racing north through the South Atlantic to the Leg 3 finish line in Punta del Este, Uruguay, the loss of their masthead asymmetric is a major blow: “This is likely to cost us dearly in terms of performance,” admits the Italian skipper, “but there’s absolutely nothing we can do about it as the sail cannot be fixed on board.”

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Two GOR Class40s head back to New Zealand

There has been intense drama in Leg 3 of the double-handed Global Ocean Race (GOR) as two of the Class40s, Buckley Systems and Campagne de France, have turned west and are currently heading for Auckland, New Zealand, while the three remaining boats, Cessna Citation, Financial Crisis and Phesheya-Racing continue into strong, Pacific Ocean headwinds in the Roaring Forties.

 On Thursday evening at 48S, Ross and Campbell Field – leading the fleet on Buckley Systems – and Halvard Mabire and Miranda Merron on the Franco-British entry, Campagne de France in second place, trailing the Fields by 20 miles, abruptly turned north. Initially this was thought to be a move to avoid 40-50-knot headwinds, but injury and gear damage on Buckley Systems had forced the Fields to head for port with Mabire and Merron making the same decision.

 Meanwhile, Conrad Colman and Adrian Kuttel have taken over pole position with Cessna Citation; Marco Nannini and Hugo Ramon are up to second place with Financial Crisis and the South African duo of Nick Leggatt and Phillippa Hutton-Squire are now in third with Phesheya-Racing.

For the Fields who are currently leading the GOR overall on points, the decision to turn Buckley Systems towards New Zealand was indescribably hard: “A tough way to have a year of blood, sweat and tears collapse in front of you,” reports Campbell Field. Equipment failure, including part of the mainsheet system, has contributed to the father-and-son team turning west, but injury to Ross Field is a major factor. “On Leg 2, Ross took a couple of tumbles that would have stretchered-off any mere mortal with a bruise on one hip that looked like someone had taken to him with a baseball bat,” Campbell Field explains.

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A Formidable Challenge to Boats and Sailors

(February 5, 2012) - The double-handed Global Ocean Race (GOR) fleet of five Class40s started the 6,200-mile Leg 3 on January 29th from Wellington, New Zealand, to Punta del Este, Uruguay, and less than a week later the top two teams in the overall standings have called it quits.

 After crashing off a monstrous wave in the Southern Ocean last Thursday evening, leaders Ross and Campbell Field of Team Buckley Systems have suffered damage to their yacht and are heading back to New Zealand.

 "We were leading the fleet under autopilot in big rolling seas," said Ross Field. "The wind was up to 45 knots, gusting into the 50s. Campbell was on watch in the cockpit and I was down below in the navigation station, when we just launched off a huge wave."

 As the yacht crashed down into the trough behind the wave, all the wind instruments were wiped off the top of the mast. Ross Field was flung across the boat, injuring his back. The loss of the wind instruments meant their autopilots could not function, and they would have had to hand-steer the boat nearly 6,000 miles toward Cape Horn and up to Uruguay.

 Without the autopilot, the Fields instantly spun out of control and crash gybed. "We ended up with all our ballast on the wrong side and lying with the mast virtually in the water, at the mercy of the waves," said Ross.

 After bringing the boat under control and assessing their situation, the father and son pair decided they could not continue racing.

 Halvard Mabire and Miranda Merron on the Franco-British entry, Campagne de France in second place, were trailing the Fields by 20 miles when they had enough. "Given the weather and sea conditions we have encountered and given the forecast weather along the northerly route which we have to take because of ice to the south, we felt that there was a strong possibility of boat breakage on this leg if we were to continue," explained Halvard Mabire on Friday afternoon.

 "It is the responsibility of each skipper to assess the risks involved and to decide to race or continue racing based on conditions experienced or expected," Merron explains. "Our decision to head back is the result of this assessment. It has been an incredibly difficult decision to take, and one not taken lightly. We have spent almost two years focused on this project and there are a considerable number of people who are supporting this campaign."

 "We are waiting to hear whether they will rejoin the race later on or not," noted Race Director Josh Hall. "In the meantime the three other teams in Leg 3 are plugging into some very tough conditions. It is disappointing that the weather pattern is not currently providing the downwind sleigh-ride normally expected, but this is one of many reasons that racing around the world is a formidable challenge to boats and sailors."

 Race website: http://globaloceanrace.com/