With about 100 nautical miles to go, Leg 7 of the Volvo Ocean Race (VOR) was bordering on being disastrous for Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing (ADOR).
A couple of tactical errors, two stricken crew early in the leg and an untimely meeting with a floating wooden pallet had seen the race leaders slip to fifth place.
Worse was that Dongfeng Race Team, who had built a six-point overall lead over ADOR’s Azzam boat before the leg, were threatening a podium finish, maybe even second place, which would have cut the Azzam crew’s lead to just three points.
In the end, a late surge by Team Mapfre and Team Alvimedica relegated Dongfeng to fourth place, one ahead of Azzam, so the lead was reduced by only a point.
More good news arrived for Azzam in Lisbon last Wednesday when an independent race jury penalised three boats for infractions during the Newport to Lisbon leg.
One of them was Dongfeng, who had a point added to their overall total (lowest points wins in the race), which took Azzam’s lead back to six points.
Now, with just two legs to go, a sequence that could have landed lasting blows on Azzam suddenly turned to the ADOR boat’s advantage.
Time and mileage are running out for Azzam’s challengers.
The race resumes on Sunday with the eighth and shortest leg, from Lisbon to Lorient, in Brittany, France.
It should take the fleet up to four days to sail the 647nm.
Not that the leg is expected to be any easier as the weather expected for the start is uncertain.
“It’s probably one of the toughest legs in the first 12 to 24 hours with 40 to 45 knots upwind,” said Bouwe Bekking, the skipper of Team Brunel who won Leg 7 and are in joint second-place overall.
Ian Walker, the Azzam skipper, has been left more cautious – and determined – by the recent happy events and refused on Saturday to consider his team’s prospects of victory.
“There’s a lot of this race left,” he said. “In offshore sailing you can lose going up a river. I’ve seen Admiral’s Cups lost in the dying seconds. We’re a long, long way from winning the race. I prefer to not even look at the scores. The other teams know they have plenty of chances to beat us.”
Walker is right to be guarded. What the points penalty and last leg has done is to complicate Azzam’s position at the top.
Instead of worrying mostly about covering Dongfeng, as had been the strategy, they now have to worry about Brunel as well.
“We’ve got to finish in the top three or top four twice, or just beat them (Brunel and Dongfeng),” Walker said.
“Anything can still happen to Abu Dhabi on these next two legs, so we haven’t lost sight of the chance of beating them,” said Charles Caudrelier, the Dongfeng skipper.
“Of course, now Brunel are also in the picture, which perhaps makes it just as complicated for Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing as it does for us. Who will cover whom?”
Azzam will be without Emirati sailor Adil Khalid, who has had a recurrence of the stomach bug that forced him to miss two earlier legs in the race. He returned for the latest leg but was ill again within the first couple of days.
He will be replaced by Louis Sinclair, the reserve under-30 sailor.
“I’m obviously gutted to miss Leg 8,” Khalid said. “I thought my Abu Dhabi rehab had shaken this bug off once and for all, but it’s returned with a vengeance.”
The leg also marks the much-awaited return to the race of Team Vestas Wind, who have been out of the race since their boat was grounded on a shallow reef in the Indian Ocean during the second leg last November.
Vestas announced their intention to rebuild their boat and return to the race during the stopover in Abu Dhabi and have overcome many obstacles to make their return in Lisbon.
“The sailing itself is like riding a bicycle,” skipper Chris Nicholson said. “But there are a few nerves ahead of the leg, which is unusual for me. We can’t win the race but we’ve still been racing to get here. I’m really happy with how things have gone this week.”
osamiuddin@thenational.ae
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