Race 9 Day 3: GREAT Britain in lead after taking westerly course

The fleet is making steady progress towards China, with around 20 knots of wind coming from the north east and several of the yachts very close to each other as they beat through the busy shipping lanes of the South China Sea. 

GREAT Britain is now leading the fleet, followed by Old Pulteney and Team Garmin in third. These yachts took a more westerly course yesterday as the fleet split off to pass an island.

Eric Holden, skipper of Henri Lloyd, in seventh, said his team was in in a tight race with Derry~Londonderry~Doire whilst other teams close in.

“It has been back and forth with who is faster all day and night. PSP Logistics is only a couple miles further behind. Alas OneDLL just popped up about 12 miles ahead so the westerly boats seem to have done a bit better than us to the east. It looks like we are pretty close to Switzerland coming across behind OneDLL.

“We have made some errors over the last couple days so it is not that bad a position and it is still very close, however gains upwind are very small and it can take days to claw back even a couple of miles.”

Sean McCarter, skipper of Derry~Londonderry~Doire, said: “After finding our pace yesterday, it wasn't long before we were up amongst the leaders of the eastern group. Ourselves, Henri Lloyd and PSP Logistics were in sight of each other for a lot of yesterday afternoon and last night until PSP Logistics tacked off early this morning. Qingdao is a bit further ahead with a 'Home Port Curse' to break! This superstition certainly isn't slowing them down at the moment.”

To read all the skipper reports click here 

To track the fleet’s progress on the official Race Viewer click here