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Club Med wins The Race! A vigorous westerly airstream pushes Club Med through the Straits of Gibralter and on to the finish line at Marseilles just 62 days after starting at Barcelona! Meanwhile, Warta Polpharma hides in the lee of Cape Horn to escape nasty weather. March 4, 2001 That awfully big low, which threatened the mid Atlantic with wild weather, finally quit its stalling and rushed across the east Atlantic into Europe. Right on its tail was the big blue maxicat, Club Med. A second low to the west conspired to create an ideal downwind situation, with westerly flow driven by two systems. The uninterrupted tailwinds were almost perfect for Club Med, except that with wind dead astern, she needed to jibe downwind to reach 100 per cent efficiency. And this she did - jibe, and jibe again all the way up the North African coast and into the Mediterranean. Innovation Explorer, meanwhile, was positioned further south when she caught the westerly wind associated with The Low, and benefited from a better sailing angle. With no need to jibe, Loick Peyron and Skip Novak reeled in some 200 miles on Club Med in the 36 hours before she entered the Straits of Gibralter. The finish was magic - a blustery winter's night on the south coast of France, old world surrounds and out of the black comes this craft of the future - at a cool 20 knots! It was a great way to end a remarkable voyage: 27,000 miles in 62 days at an average speed of 18 knots! Wild, wild south Meanwhile, in the South Atlantic, Team Adventure is battling headwinds and trying to keep the boat together for the trip home, while Warta Polpharma is hiding in the lee of Cape Horn waiting for a complicated low pressure system to roar overhead. Needless to say, there is not a lot of racing going on down south! Tony Bullimore and Team Legato remain ensnared by light winds and must be certain by now that they indeed once stepped on a Chinaman ... or have they simply fallen foul of yet another kink in the jet stream?
East Atlantic surface pressure Image courtesy of UK Met Bureau. This animated three day pressure forecast shows two low pressure centres moving through the Bay of Biscay, driving westerly winds into the Straits of Gibralter and beyond. Club Med experienced 30 knot westerlies on her passage through the straits, with winds maintaining 30-35 knots most of the way to Marseilles. The wind dropped on the final approach, but the big blue maxicat finished strongly, with a reported 20 knots of boat speed - enough to surprise most of the onlookers! Europe in infra-red Image courtesy of UK Met Bureau. This animated image of clouds over Europe looks complicated. It is. There are several low pressure centres forming in these frames - in particular one in the Bay of Biscay driving westerly winds into the Mediterranean. Judging by the squall clouds west of this developing Biscay low, it is a good thing the maxi-cats aren't headed for Les Sables d'Ollone, unlike some unlucky skippers in the Vendee Globe. All of these storms make up a large area of low pressure. on the equatorial side of this system are westerly winds, punctuated by cold fronts bringing stronger gusts. This is a similar system to that enjoyed by Club Med on her approach to the horn. This time, it is not the end of the southern ocean that awaits them, but victory in The Race! Synoptic situation and fleet
positions In this position report, 550 miles and 36 hours before Club Med crossed the finish line at Marseilles, you can see the leader's thin blue line zig-zagging up the North African coast and into the Mediterranean. Innovation Explorer's course is much straighter. When Club Med was sailing towards Gibralter, winds were west, south west - dead astern and jibing was the only way to get the right wind angles for peak performance. For Innovation Explorer, the winds appear more south, giving the second-placed cat a naturally better angle. The result was a gain of some 200 miles to Innovation Explorer over Club Med. Picture courtesy of Virtual Spectator. East Atlantic surface pressure Image courtesy of Ocean Weather Another look at the east Atlantic, with isobars clearly showing low pressure stretching from Newfoundland deep into Europe. Cape Horn in
infra-red Antarctic Marine Research Centre, This animation, with frames taken every six hours, starts seven hours before Team Adventure rounds the horn and finishes with Warta Polpharma hiding in the lee of this legend landmark awaiting an icy blast from the west as a low whistles over the top of them. With thousands of miles separating these two boats from the leaders, and from tailender Team Legato, there is little reason to race flat-out. When given the chance, these seasoned veterans prefer to hunker down and ride out the nasty weather. Four day wind forecast for the
Atlantic This animated forecast shows plenty of action in the North Atlantic, but storm centres will migrate to the north again, bringing high pressure to the west of the Canaries once again. For innovation Explorer, the favourable westerly stream will remain long enough for them to finish a comfortable second. Meanwhile, in the South Atlantic, Team Adventure and Warta Polpharma must navigate between two zones of high pressure, with northerly winds creating difficult sailing. These maxicats are not comfortable at all beating to windward! © Jamie Brown/weather-wise.com 2001 Saturday, March 3, 9.00 pm GMT “Race headquarters, race headquarters . . . Club Med is making 20 knots. They'll be on the line 10 minutes from now.” . . . The VHF crackled, the atmosphere intensified around the Frioul Islands – the escort and spectator boats performed a sometimes dubious but always enthusiastic ballet. Then everything sped up: The vessel appeared at a speed that took everyone by surprise. “They have crossed the line.” It's official. Distress flares light the sky . . . Club Med is here, the overall winner.
It's 8:56 pm, the distant beast slows down. A red glow lights up the mainsail;
all the crew are on the deck holding distress flares. The circle of boats is
like a swarm of moths drawn to the light. The old harbor stretches out in the
background, enchanting with its lighthouses and timeless appearance. From
afar, we can see the sails slowly lowering to the deck. We imagine the men
going through their last routines, which on this occasion won't have the same
mechanical feeling as when racing.
62 days at sea. 62 days for a circumnaviagtion at an average speed of more than 18 knots. Nearly 27,000 miles in the most testing conditions that the watery planet can deliver to sailors. Is it still, at this moment in time, a matter of records? It's okay to be uncertain, because even if Club Med has won a race, it's the adventure that's stolen the scene in the Phocaean city. For confirmation you only have to look in the eyes of those waiting on the Quai des Belges. The catamaran's size takes on surreal proportions as she approaches the pontoon specially installed for her arrival. Incredible – Big Blue in all her splendor, showing off her beam of almost 18 meters (59 feet) amid the little pleasure boats and the local “pointies.” The crowd of crewmembers all dressed in yellow is still milling around on the trampoline, the boat comes alongside . . . A few moments later all hell breaks loose: Grant Dalton's buddies hurl him into the blue water of the old harbor, quickly followed by Franck Proffit! After the spray, a total bath awaits the conquering heroes . . .If they didn't like water, they should have chosen a different line of work. This may seem like a silly ritual, but this outburst stems from a tremendous sense of relief: relief for having arrived safe and sound at the end of a dangerous undertaking, and in the same stroke becoming the fastest men to sail around the planet. It's a baptism by immersion in the water of the Mediterranean to celebrate their victorious return. What they're feeling, at this precise moment, will doubtless remain among their most intense memories . . . A well earned rite, and a victory that will be written large in the annals of ocean racing. Bravo, or thank-you? Both, captain . . . and our most profound respects. More great reading: Catch up on all the past action in our race archive. Here it from the horse's mouth at race headquarters. re-live the action between the world's toughest solo skippers in the Vendee Globe. Re-live the Sydney to Hobart yacht race! Break ice in the Ross Sea! Re-live Bernard Stamm's record-breaking Atlantic crossing |