Team Brunel in the mid-Atlantic / Volvo Ocean Race Leg 9, 2018-05-25

Helm: Kyle Langford
Windspeed: Gusting to 30 knots
Boatspeed: 25 knots
Drone operator: Sam Greenfield

I gif’d this from the Season’s Greetings from The Ocean Race! video that came out on Christmas Eve. But if you like it you should totally check out the original raw-content video uploaded by Sam:

My partial transcript/commentary, entered as I was first watching the video, from my obligatory obsessive spreadsheet:

Sam: It’s blowing 30 knots outside, and we’re going 30 knots, so we’re gonna try to launch the Phantom Pro in these conditions. He launches the drone. Amazing footage of Brunel surfing in 30 knot winds from the drone. Major stuff of the bow. Title (as the picture goes wobbly): Finally the camera gimbal starts shorting out from salt and moisture. Drone comes in for the recovery, but the crewmember with a chest camera waiting to catch it misses it and it goes back aft toward Kyle, who makes a one-handed catch of it while continuing to HELM THE BOAT WITH HIS OTHER HAND. Thank you and good night.

Extra fun: Here’s a screenshot of the live tracker from that day showing the weather system they were riding:

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At this point, honestly, I agree. I love a come-from-behind victory. But for myself I’ll be thrilled no matter who wins. It’s a no-lose scenario for me.

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dreaminsailor
replied to your photoset “Ooh, split developing with the upcoming exclusion zones. Dongfeng…”

I wonder if this also means that Brunel can bear away and make more speed and actually overtake Mapfre now

Seems like Brunel will have a faster angle than MAPFRE as they head for that gap in the exclusion zones. So yeah, they should be able to make up some distance. And of course, Brunel’s position with respect to AkzoNobel doesn’t matter in terms of the overall race. It’s a match race between Brunel and MAPFRE in terms of that outside route.

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Retrospective on Leg 10 from Brunel.

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@a-solitary-sea-rover: You can tell your mom her team is absolutely in this. Can’t wait to see who pulls it out in the next leg!

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OMG I know, right? How about the drone footage of the horse *at the helm*? I couldn’t not think of John Mulaney: “There’s a HORSE… on the WHEEL… of the SAILBOAT!!” 🤣

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yachtmasters:

Salt Water 😆 by straorza

The Captioner:

I thought I recognized a VOR65 foredeck, and some google image search confirms. That’s the bow of Team Brunel, shot by Kurt Arrigo during the July, 2014 Round Canary Islands Race, in which Brunel beat MAPFRE and SCA in a preliminary event before the 2014/15 Volvo.

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Brunel rounding Cape Horn, March 30, 2015. Source.

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Ugh. These poor guys. What a rollercoaster this leg has been for them.

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Reshuffled

Here’s the last four days from the tracker. The DTL figures are now actually meaningful, since the boats are on the final sprint toward Auckland.

Yesterday the fleet hit the doldrums proper, which led to a wonderful 5-way park up. SCA made a strong move to the west to try to avoid the mess, and for a while it appeared to be working, but then they, too, hit the light stuff.

The trio of Dongfeng, ADOR, and Mapfre escaped first. Since then Mapfre has fallen 11 miles behind, so at this point it looks like Dongfeng and ADOR are the favorites to win the leg.

The story aboard Brunel has been especially interesting to me. They seemed like they had the win locked up a week ago, but then first one crewmember, and then three more, came down with the flu, and now they’re at the back of the fleet. I realize they’ve had some bad luck wind-wise, but I wonder if their weakened condition was the major difference.

If so, it might mean that the strength deficit aboard SCA is a bigger factor than I’d previously thought. Yes, they have three extra crewmembers, but from what I’ve heard that doesn’t make up completely for the strength issue. Sailing a Volvo 65 is so physically demanding, with upper-body strength so crucial for changing sails and shifting moveable ballast, that maybe an all-woman team has the deck stacked against them, so to speak.

There are a lot of other factors in the mix; I’ve talked elsewhere about what I think might be going on. But seeing the way Brunel has dropped off the pace has me wondering.

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Heh. Strictly business.

Team Brunel is currently leading leg 4 of the 38,000-mile Volvo Ocean Race.

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Team Brunel’s Valentine’s Day video.

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Things are definitely looking up for SCA (and Brunel). The official race tracker shows them in last and next-to-last place, respectively, but a consensus is emerging, both from experts on shore and from the boats themselves, that the two boats have effectively taken the lead.

Campbell Field’s latest routing run shows Brunel finishing first, SCA finishing a little under 3 hours later, and the rest of the fleet 15 hours after that. Anything could happen, of course, but that must be a great feeling for those two boats. 

The latest photo posted from SCA, which I’m guessing was taken just before sunset Thursday local time, shows (I think) Sam on the wheel, Dee trimming the mainsheet, and Eloide closest to the camera, all of them smiling.

Meanwhile aboard Dongfeng, currently last in the southern group (though just barely; all four are within five miles of each other), Martin (on the helm) and Eric look less happy. OBR Sam posted this to the team’s blog today:

The morning got off to a grim start, albeit Israel was only telling me the facts as he looked over the positions at the chart desk.

“The teams that went North will smash us, we should have done that.”

At that point we were in last place, or at least near the end of the pack. I never really know for certain. But smash is such a strong word.

“It was a mistake,” admitted Charles. “We wanted to go north but no one else was so we stayed with the group.”

I didn’t say anything, only gave him the look, which has become code for give me something better than that.

“It was a lack of courage,” he admitted.

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The northern route could be in the process of paying off. In the latest update Brunel and SCA are in 23 knots of wind, surfing at 19 knots. The four to the south have 9 knots of wind and 9 knots of boatspeed. It’s still early on, and they have a lot of distance to make up, especially given that Auckland is SE of them. But so far they’re looking pretty good.

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Argh. The only way to track this in real time at the moment is by following the @VO65_DONGFENG (Yann) and @DongfengRacing (shore team) Twitter feeds. Which, if you know about my love-hate relationship with Twitter, is doubly frustrating.

Anyway, it looks like Brunel has passed Dongfeng to retake the lead. But the wind near the finish is light, so who knows? Hopefully the livestream will come online shortly.

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They’re basically overlapping icons in the 0340 UTC tracker update. Make it live, VOR central! The suspense is killing me!

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The Gulf of Oh, Man

Sorry for the pun. But this is awesome.

The three leaders spent the last 24 hours fighting their way through extremely light winds in the Gulf of Oman. As of yesterday the order was Brunel in front, Dongfeng close behind, and ADOR somewhat farther behind.

Brunel is keeping a tight cover on Dongfeng. But that has opened up a route closer to shore for ADOR, and Ian Walker has taken it. You’d think he knows what he’s doing, too, because over the past several years the Abu Dhabi team has spent a lot of time sailing in these waters during their training.

As of the 1540 update today the tracker shows:

1. Brunel, leading
2. ADOR, 2.9 miles from the lead
3. Dongfeng, 4.2 miles from the lead

At this point any of those three could totally win it, and each scenario would make me happy in a different way:

• If they finish in the order of Brunel, Dongfeng, and ADOR, then all three boats will be tied for the lead going into Leg 3. How cool would that be?
• If Dongfeng can manage to pass Brunel and win the leg, I’d be ecstatic. Go Dongfeng! They’re my favorites after SCA.
• If ADOR can pass inshore and win, the UAE is going to erupt. Adil (the Emirati crewmember who also sailed the last VOR) is a national hero already. But a dramatic come-from-behind victory played out along the coast into Abu Dhabi (which would also give ADOR a big lead in the race overall), and I think the country will basically just shut down. Ferraris for everyone!

I’d love to see that.

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My man-crush Yann Riou on Dongfeng, always in position for the great shot: This one of Brunel, crossing behind them around 0601 UTC today (November 29), as both boats were negotiating the eye of the tropical depression.

The depression turned out to be weaker than it might have been; there was a decent swell and 30+ knots of wind, but not the storm conditions I’d been guilty of hyping. Each boat in the fleet sailed in toward the center of it on starboard, then gybed and headed out on port.

The fleet stretched out in the process, which was good for the leaders but really bad for the three trailers (Vestas, Alvimedica, and SCA), though Campbell Field, who’s been blogging about the navigation and routing, thinks SCA will be pulled back close before the end due to the fleet compressing as it hits lighter wind to the north.

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from-the-helm:

sinusamoris:

Don’t forget the VOR

How could you?! This year’s race is awesome.

Team Brunel OBR Stefan Coppers, taking pictures like a boss. :-)

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