Race Director's Report
Race 8: Da Nang, Vietnam to Qingdao, China

At the crew briefing, I billed this race as a boat and crew breaker and if that was what the skippers and crew were expecting then they weren’t disappointed. The breakages began when Unicef’s main halyard parted a couple of minutes before race start and they had to limp around the inshore course behind the rest of the fleet. Unfortunately it wasn’t until well into the next day that they resolved this issue and then found it difficult to recover. They did make it into ninth place but their race came to an end prematurely a week later when they diverted to Shanghai to disembark an injured crew person.

Why is this relatively short race so tough? The course sets the yachts directly into the prevailing wind of the North East Monsoon. When you couple this with the effects of the current going in the opposite direction it sets up a wind over tide scenario. This causes large waves to form which then have no back to them. The yachts literally launch out of the back of the waves into free fall, slamming their way most of the way to Qingdao.

Clipper Telemed+ whilst leading the fleet unfortunately had part of their main sail track pull off the mast. This meant they could not use their main sail until it was repaired. Without the engine of the sail wardrobe their fleet positioned suffered badly.

South of the rhumb line (direct route from Da Nang to Taiwan) the rest of the fleet beat to windward, tacking quite close to the coast of the Philippines, before heading north through the Luzon straights and into the Ocean Sprint. Derry~Londonderry~Doire set a blistering pace to scoop the two points that were up for grabs. No other boat came close to their time. In fact nothing stopped them as they also passed through the Scoring Gate in first place too.

The forecast was ominous…a large wind hole followed by a strong northerly breeze. The wind hole turned out to be slightly larger than expected, slowing the fleet considerably. But if the teams were wishing for more wind then it eventually arrived in the form of an 80 knot gale. This scattered the fleet, some unable to make any progress to windward and others opting to hove-to to sit it out. All the teams pulled through this to then be confronted with even larger fishing fleets than they had seen previously. The sheer number of fishing boats is unbelievable, stretching from horizon to horizon. Collision avoidance and keeping a good lookout taking its toll on the already exhausted skippers and crew alike.

The final sprint into the finish was a nail-biter. Less than one hour separated first place Derry~Londonderry~Doire from Second place Garmin. Derry~Londonderry~Doire completing a rare clean sweep of Scoring Gate, Ocean Sprint and race bullet to score a maximum 17 points.

Each of the 12 brave and exhausted teams were treated to the unique Qingdao arrival ceremony, including drummers parading the teams to the stage. Culminating in each skipper being presented with a victory cape and staffed banner.

Next up the Mighty Pacific!