Volvo Ocean Race: Brunel holds lead, wins Leg 7

Lisbon, Portugal (May 27, 2015) – Team Brunel (Bouwe Bekking/NED) completed a triumphant Leg 7 early on Wednesday to bolster their hopes of finishing with a podium place in the Volvo Ocean Race and also keep alive the possibility of overall victory.

The Dutch boat sailed a near faultless transatlantic stage, edging MAPFRE (Iker Martínez/ESP) into second, just under 22 minutes behind.

Behind them, Team Alvimedica (Charlie Enright/USA) edged out long-time leg leaders, Dongfeng Race Team (Charles Caudrelier/FRA), after an enthralling dogfight over the final miles.

The Chinese-backed boat was caught by Enright’s crew in the early hours of Wednesday, but battled their way back and looked sure to overtake them again before a botched tack ruined their chances.

They lost out by just 55 seconds after nearly nine days and 13 hours of sailing across 2,800 nautical miles (nm).

With overall leaders Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing (Ian Walker/GBR) finishing fifth ahead of Team SCA (Sam Davies/GBR), the overall race standings are left finely poised.

The Emirati crew now have a five-point lead over Dongfeng Race Team with two short legs to sail, while Team Brunel are a point further adrift of Charles Caudrelier’s crew.

Caudrelier made no attempt to hide his disappointment after leading the leg for so long and seeing a podium place disappear in the final miles.

“I’m feeling very bad, very upset and very sad,” he summed up. “We deserved better, but I guess that’s life.

“Most of all, I’m upset with myself because my crew did a great job and I made a huge mistake – and I don’t accept mistakes. We really missed a chance in this leg with Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing finishing fifth.”

Few sailors in the fleet will savour a win over one of the race’s trademark legs more than Team Brunel’s 51-year-old skipper, Bouwe Bekking, in his record-equalling seventh appearance.

He has certainly experienced the ups and downs of racing across the Atlantic. Few will forget the agonising position he faced in 2006 before he was finally forced to abandon his sinking movistar boat during the same stage of that Volvo Ocean Race.

Bekking insisted last week that he had not lost ‘a single night’s sleep’ over the incident and the confident way that Team Brunel sailed the leg would bear that out.

Team Brunel were harried all the way over the past 24 hours by both MAPFRE and Dongfeng Race Team, especially over the final few miles when the breeze dropped to almost zero in the Tagus River as they approached the Lisbon finish.

“We sailed a tremendous leg but just at the end when there was no wind, it was getting a bit gnarly,” said Bekking. “But we pulled it off.”

The victory was achieved with two newcomers on board, Adam Minoprio (NZL) and Timo Hagoort (NED), the latter replacing the injured Gerd-Jan Poortman (NED).

“It was good to have those young guys on board, they did a fantastic job,” added Bekking.

Team SCA crossed the line, some four hours and 22 minutes behind Team Brunel, after an action-packed transatlantic leg in which they sailed within the pack for much of the nine days and at one stage threatened a podium finish after taking a bold strategic choice around the Azores High.

The final two stages, to Lorient (France) and then Gothenburg (Sweden) via a pit-stop in The Hague (Netherlands), will once again be contested by seven boats.

Team Vestas Wind (Chris Nicholson/AUS) rejoin the fleet for the first time since November 29 when the boat was grounded on a reef in the Indian Ocean.

After a four-month rebuild in the Persico boatyard in Bergamo, Italy, the boat was transported by sea and road to Lisbon, arriving a few hours before the rest of the fleet in the small hours of Wednesday morning.

Over the next few days, the rig will be stepped ahead of the Danish-backed team’s competitive comeback on June 6 in the Lisbon In-Port Race. Leg 8 to Lorient, a relative sprint at 647nm, begins a day later.

The seventh leg, from Newport, USA to Lisbon, Portugal (2,800 nm), began May 17. The penultimate leg of the Volvo Ocean Race from Lisbon, Portugal to Lorient, France (647 nm) will start on June 7 with an ETA between June 9 and 12.

Protest: The Race Committee has filed protests against SCA, Dongfeng, and MAPRE for infractions that occurred soon after the Leg 7 start on May 17 when the fleet approached the eastern corridor of the Rhode Island Traffic Separation Scheme (TSS), an exclusion zone that the fleet was required to avoid. Details.

Leg 7 (2,800 nm) Standings
1. Team Brunel, Bouwe Bekking (NED), Finished May 27, 09d 11h 09m 49s
2. MAPFRE, Iker Martínez (ESP), Finished May 27, 09d 11h 31m 39s
3. Team Alvimedica, Charlie Enright (USA), Finished May 27, 09d 12h 50m 49s
4. Dongfeng Race Team, Charles Caudrelier (FRA), Finished May 27, 09d 12h 51m 44s
5. Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, Ian Walker (GBR), Finished May 27, 09d 13h 24m 34s
6. Team SCA, Sam Davies (GBR), Finished May 27, 09d 15h 32m 38s
7. Team Vestas Wind, Chris Nicholson (AUS), Did not start

Overall Standings (after 7 of 9 legs)
1. Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing (UAE), 1-3-2-2-1-2-5 = 16 points
2. Dongfeng Race Team (CHN), 2-2-1-3-8-1-4 = 21
3. Team Brunel (NED), 3-1-5-5-4-3-1 = 22
4. MAPRE (ESP), 7-4-4-1-2-4-2 = 26*
5. Team Alvimedica (TUR/USA), 5-4-3-4-3-5-3 = 27
6. Team SCA (SWE), 6-6-6-6-5-6-6 = 41
7. Team Vestas Wind (DNK), 4-8-8-8-8-8-8 = 52
* 2 point penalty after Leg 5 (details)

Race website – Tracking – Scoreboard – Videos

 

 

Background: The 2014-15 Volvo Ocean Race began in Alicante, Spain on Oct. 11 with the final finish on June 27 in Gothenburg, Sweden. Racing the new one design Volvo Ocean 65, seven teams will be scoring points in 9 offshore legs to determine the overall Volvo Ocean Race winner. Additionally, the teams will compete in 10 In-Port races at each stopover for a separate competition, the Volvo Ocean Race In-Port Series.