The New Murphy's Law: What can go right will go right

January 01, 2005

MacArthur takes direct aim as she homes in on record
By Edward Gorman, Sailing Correspondent



SAILING in fog and with the ever-present danger of hitting ice northwest of Macquarie Island, midway between New Zealand and Antarctica, Ellen MacArthur, on B&Q, was yesterday 61 hours ahead of the 72-day solo round-the-world record on her 34th day at sea.
Despite tackling two big storms in the southern Indian Ocean over Christmas, MacArthur has made her biggest gains on the mark held by Francis Joyon, of France, over the past week. The main reason being that, while Joyon was forced to sail IDEC, his 90ft trimaran, well north of the fastest route under Australia because of storm activity to the south of him, MacArthur has stayed on a direct course.



It has been a period when MacArthur has excelled in keeping B&Q on track through storm conditions of her own. During one phase she was able to sail ahead of a storm, then through it and then catch up with it again so that she could use its power for a second time. This required relentless activity on deck and constant sail changing to keep B&Q at optimum speed.

Now at the halfway point as she enters the southern Pacific Ocean for the long haul to Cape Horn, having covered 13,725 nautical miles at an average speed of 17.4 knots, MacArthur is once again tackling lighter winds but also ice and fog.

“I still can’t see in front of the boat at all,” she said, as B&Q ran at 22 knots of boatspeed before a northwesterly wind averaging 21 knots. “I’ve got the radar on and it’s hard not to look in front of the boat every five minutes. I really don’t want to see an iceberg, especially at this speed.”.

In the Vendée Globe single-handed round-the-world race, Mike Golding, in third place on Ecover, is hoping to reach Cape Horn by Monday. Shifting winds in the southeastern Pacific saw Golding’s deficit on the leader, Jean Le Cam, of France, on Bonduelle, increase from less than 200 miles to 313 miles last night. But Golding aims to recover in the coming days as Le Cam and Vincent Riou, in second place on PRB, stall ahead of him.

With the news that Marc Thiercelin, the Frenchman, has become the fifth competitor to abandon the race, diverting to New Zealand to make repairs to Proform, Conrad Humphreys, on Hellomoto, lies tenth — a superb effort from the Briton only three weeks after a stop for repairs near Cape Town left him at the back of the 17-yacht fleet .