12:00 PM Tue 24 Feb 2009 GMT
South... south-east... south... south-east... it doesn't seem to matter - any which way Ericsson 4 gains. Torben Grael and his boys have edged another 20 miles ahead in the last 24 hours, despite the chasing pair of Ericsson 3 and Puma cutting the corner.
Corner, what corner? I hear you ask. We left the fleet gliding south yesterday, headed for New Zealand, the scoring gate and the Southern Ocean. Then everything changed, and the skippers and navigators sent out the new orders - revert to plan b - and on deck, the boys tossed aside the brochures packed full of the delights of Vanuatu, and booked a Fijian surf trip. Ton Franken, writing in yesterday's comments, may well be right - the fleet could end up splitting around Fiji.
Meanwhile, the Dragon stirs in its lair - the instrument data has started reporting again. And although they may have dropped back to fifth overnight, navigator, Wouter the Routeur, is the man with the plan.
At 10:00 ZULU this morning, the fleet had wheeled into a steep turn back to the south-east. The wind had picked up to around 12-14 knots (TWS in the Data Centre), and shifted back to the east-northeast. And Ericsson 4 had extended to a position about 40 miles due south of Puma and Ericsson 3.
The consensus on the course broke down early afternoon yesterday, as Ericsson 4 started to diverge to the south, away from Puma and Ericsson 3. Torben Grael adjusted the trajectory of Ericsson 4 a little when he saw what was happening, but not enough to stop the leverage continuing to open.
By this morning there were 25 miles between the sets of boats tracks on the Race Viewer, measured south-west to north-east. I think that the leader has been sailing into a strengthening breeze, as she has continued to extend right through this period, so the leverage probably isn't bothering Grael too much.
Mark Chisnell - www.volvooceanrace.org
Latest Boat News:
ERICSSON 3 LEG FIVE DAY 11 QFB: received 24.02.09 0951 GMT
Happy days
People are rested now. Some have even washed themselves since we got into this lighter air yesterday. Clothes have also been washed and you see a lot of happy faces.
We are still racing close to Puma, gaining and losing depending on the different modes both boats use. It is nice to have them so close. It pushes the crew to always stay on top and make the boat perform at its best. We are happy to have caught up with Puma, but we are also trying hard to gain on Ericsson 4.
It was about time to get some rest. After we almost sunk the boat on leg four, and with big disappointment, lost what seemed to become a second position, we straight away started to look at different options on how the get back in the race as soon as possible.
It soon looked like there was no chance to get our boat to China by shipping in time. So we had a meeting with the sailors and decided that we are going to sail the boat there and in that moment we also agreed to do this leg, no matter what the timeline would be.
This leg five is THE Volvo Ocean race leg four us many Volvo rookies on Ericsson 3 and no one wanted to miss it. So everybody worked flat out from the moment we hit the shore. The boat builders and shore team made 'mission impossible' become possible.
Once the fix was done, we sailed shorthanded with seven guys to Qingdao. Just think about our gybes in 30 knots of wind with the spinnaker...
Now, after a quick and chaotic pitstop in China, we have now been blast-reaching for eight days. And we really needed some rest. All this shows the dedication from the whole core crew of Ericsson 3, led by Mange (Magnus Olsson/SWE), who has, by his own example, taught us all that the boat and the team comes first. Our baby is our tool and we need to treat her well.
Thomas Johanson - helmsman
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TELEF?NICA BLUE LEG FIVE DAY 11 QFB: received 24.02.09 0225 GMT
Hi there,
I think I mentioned the other day that it sounded crazy that we were all looking forward to the doldrums. Well it soon became apparent that if we didn't get lighter winds soon then everyone was going to go crazy. A week of wet blast reaching was more than enough and, as the week wore on, some of the antics on board got more and more bizarre!! I won't go into details but suffice to say it was quite amusing on deck watching what people were doing to keep themselves entertained. Singing, exercise routines.. You name it... all in the relentless spray.
Anyway, we have all managed to escape with our sanity, just, as yesterday the winds finally eased, the sun came out and the boat started to dry out a little. Yesterday afternoon the deck rather resembled a Laundromat as opposed to a race yacht as every piece of available space was dedicated to drying clothes. This was followed by a frantic tidy up as the first of the afternoon rain showers approached attempting to undo all of the previous hours drying!
The lighter winds have also given us opportunity to fix up the boat a little, and our guest star from the black boat, David Vera, has proven himself to be the Spanish version of MacGyver, having fixed everything on the list almost quicker than people can spot the problems!
The final benefit of the softer breeze has meant that, finally, we have also been able to get some fresh air downstairs and, as a result, everything smells much fresher. It was starting to get a little bit hard on the nose at times, especially with everything damp and all the hatches closed to keep water out. One crew member was even accused of smelling like an 'Elephant'! However, the most unusual and perhaps off-putting smell to come out of the hatch the other night was the overpowering waft of cologne as someone tried to freshen themselves up - trust me this was even more horrible than any of the farm animal smells that may have been mentioned in previous days!
Cleaning and fixing aside, we are continuing to go well and have been chasing down the leaders in front, slowly but surely. It seems to be something of a drag race at this stage so it is with great pleasure I have been trimming and driving every few hours contributing to making the boat go fast through the water, I am certainly enjoying my change of role onboard and, funnily enough, since the sun has come out I haven't been missing the computer at all!
Cheers, for now,
Simon Fisher - strategist/helmsman
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by Mark Chisnell
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