The Ocean Race 2023 leg 2: Cabo Verde to Capetown

[Steve Clark]

I don’t have the sophistication of Herman and others. So I just try to interpret the tracker data. Recent reports have 11th doing the most miles per sched/day. With the tracker using only DTF, it started giving opposing data as the fleet got into the corner. This happens when you get to out to the laylines.
So it seems the truest way to see how they are doing is to look at the actual distance sailed and assume they are all going about the direction they think is strategically appropriate. Recently it seems the 11s have a click on Holcim and Biotherm. Malitzia continues to close.
SHC

 

[oceangeek]

And now they have some stronger breeze, Malizia has shown the best times over the last 4 hours, averaging 20.9 kts, compared to 20.6 for 11th, 16.6 for Holcim, and 16.6 for Bioterm. Guyot is in different weather, and only averaged 14 kts.

 

[oceangeek]

I always find moments like this fascinating in ocean racing, you’ve got 4 boats in sight of each other with over 2000nm to the finish.

Do you cover the competition and treat it like a round the cans inshore race, or have the confidence in your routing & strategy to go your own way?

Would love to listen in to some of the navigation & tactics discussions on board!

Here's some from 11th hr about just that- "The age old question of fleet racing is taking center stage: do you sail your own race or do you sail against your competitors?":

LEG 2: ONBOARD UPDATES - 11th Hour Racing Team

As the crew from 11th Hour Racing Team races from Mindelo, Cabo Verde to Cape Town, South Africa, we’re onboard with Amory Ross, our Media Crew Member, with live updates from the boat! Don’t forget you can track the fleet here. 📅 SunDAY FEBRUARY 12, 2023 🕒 0800 UTC 🌍 DISTANCE TO FINISH: 33.5...

www.11thhourracingteam.org

And here they talk about it a bit:

 

[Hitchhiker]

Here's some from 11th hr about just that- "The age old question of fleet racing is taking center stage: do you sail your own race or do you sail against your competitors?":

LEG 2: ONBOARD UPDATES - 11th Hour Racing Team

As the crew from 11th Hour Racing Team races from Mindelo, Cabo Verde to Cape Town, South Africa, we’re onboard with Amory Ross, our Media Crew Member, with live updates from the boat! Don’t forget you can track the fleet here. 📅 SunDAY FEBRUARY 12, 2023 🕒 0800 UTC 🌍 DISTANCE TO FINISH: 33.5...

www.11thhourracingteam.org

And here they talk about it a bit:

That’s was very interesting to watch. I love this screen shot. I can’t find this race in yb. Is it proprietary to the organizers?

 

[Varan]

There doesn't appear to be any issues with the port foil...

In other news...

The Ocean Race Leg 2 Day 12: Making the turn

It was near midnight UTC on Saturday night when boats in The Ocean Race fleet started to make their first significant move to the east towards Cape Town.

www.sail-world.com

 

[Fabricensis]

Malizia absolutely steaming, 10nm more over 4h than second fastest 11th hour. Might even take the lead over night?

Not bad for a team that was all but written off in this thread just a few days ago

 

[dg_sailingfan]

Malizia absolutely steaming, 10nm more over 4h than second fastest 11th hour. Might even take the lead over night?

Not bad for a team that was all but written off in this thread just a few days ago

I never wrote them off given how good they were in the later stages of Leg 1. As you say, could be very interesting indeed.
If Malizia can make the neccessary repairs in Cape Town they will be a formidable Opponent in Leg 3 I can tell you that. Seaexplorer was sorta built for Leg 3.

 

[sailing4life]

Weather routing Feb 5th

First of all a very big thank you to Nick @Expedition for offering to sponsor an Expedition weather routing license. Open CPN did crash regularly as I was trying to push it to the max with Wx routing with global professional racing. But Open CPN freeware is intended for cruising. I'm very happy to have the right sharp tool for the job.

So in the past 2 days I have been studying very hard on Expedition and trying stuff out. How to import/generate/convert GRIBs, boat positions, sat pics, polars. A steep learning curve, but I got the show on the road. And still a lot to explore in the coming time. So here we go.

Input

1. Polars IMOCA 60 @ 110% for the 4 new boats and IMOCA 2015 generation polars for Guyot. Guyot ripped their spinaker so I leave their polar "as is" for now.
2. GFS 0,25 degrees with 3 hr intervals and WW3 for waves.
3. Boats locations 11:40 UTC.
4. 3 hr calculations.

Output
Pic 1 has the big pic with Brazilian Navy synoptic chart 00 UTC today, unedited.

Pic 2 has the Aviation Weather - Sat Images Infrared-NWS-color - B1 @ 08:20 UTC.

Pic 3 has GFS wind barbs added @ 1200 UTC. The LP alley can be seen at work in the bottom part of the screenshot.

Pic 4 has Wx routing and GFS wind barbs. Clearly can be seen that the fleet has to navigate between the hammer and the anvil, aka the cold front at the Brazilian coast with 2 connected LP zones south west of the cold front and the St Helena high. Guyot, as routed 3 days earlier by me, is still projected to cut the corner compared to the other boats.

Pic 5 Moving further in the forecast the coming 2 days in order to see if and how boats catch that LP zone to their south shows that the forecast alternates the location of that LP moving west-east, and east-west. I'm not confident that GFS has got this situation accurate. A lot will depend on the mark 2 eyeball on the boats checking the clouds and barometer imho. In the morning of Feb 7th a more stable situation is projected.

Pic 6 has the fleet heading more or less directly to Capetown around Thu 9th early hours. As can be seen from the projected boat positions this is going to be a hell of a ride. As Guyot is projected to head to Capetown from higher latitude than the other 4 boats, she will gain again on the pack of 4. Going south and then back north again is a double whammy in miles for the pack- but all for VMG.

Pic 7 has the Wx table. ETA 12th before midnight. Four boats projected to finish within 1 hour, again. Guyot which stays further from the LP has less wind and pressure, but stays more north than the pack, is projected to arrive 5 hrs after the pack.

So with the wobbly location of that LP anything can happen, but chances are high that Guyot won't be the leg winner. Taking no bets on the winner yet.

PIC 1
View attachment 572664

PIC 2
View attachment 572665

PIC 3
View attachment 572666

PIC 4
View attachment 572672

PIC 5
View attachment 572667

PIC 6
View attachment 572668

PIC 7
View attachment 572671

I find it quite interesting that your routing is pushing the boats very south, I have been running same routings with expedition using Generic VO65 polars and scaled them a bit. Which works quite reasonably. But the route is way more westerly, but this is probably a difference in polars, but even more generic imoca virtual game polars are showing the more westerly option.

But it will be interested to see what the boats will do, stay around the same height as that small lp system and ride it west or dive further south towards the bigger LP and the associated front. With diving south you push yourself into last place and probably lose a lot of miles because you are sailing in way less breeze and going the wrong direction. Light winds shown in the image. But the chance of a better entry into cape town is mighty quite attractive for the crew, now the forecast for the high pressure ridge sitting there is quite rough.

 

[valor50]

I always find moments like this fascinating in ocean racing, you’ve got 4 boats in sight of each other with over 2000nm to the finish.

Do you cover the competition and treat it like a round the cans inshore race, or have the confidence in your routing & strategy to go your own way?

Would love to listen in to some of the navigation & tactics discussions on board!i

 

[fab156]

Good to see Malizia showing her donwind potential in strong winds. I talked to Boris during the design process. The team was and is very aware of the weaknesses of the design in the lower wind range (and a bit anxious because of the speed deficite when not foiling due to the shorter waterline) but this was a deliberate tradeoff. I guess we have to wait for the suthern ocean leg before we get an idea of the overall potential of Malizia during a full circumvention.

 

[valor50]

I always find moments like this fascinating in ocean racing, you’ve got 4 boats in sight of each other with over 2000nm to the finish.

Do you cover the competition and treat it like a round the cans inshore race, or have the confidence in your routing & strategy to go your own way?

Would love to listen in to some of the navigation & tactics discussions on board!

11th Hour posts a daily blog from the boat. Many of Amory’s blogs deal with strategy. I get it off their instagram account (11th Hour Racing Team), but it is available on their website as well under ‘latest news’ (11thhourracingteam.org). Today’s blog deals specifically with your question…note the date is listed wrong as 1/26, not 2/5

 

[Herman]

I have been running same routings with expedition using Generic VO65 polars and scaled them a bit.

+1 for the routing, but a VO65 is really a different kind of boat than an IMOCA 60. Non-foiling. Including very different polars.

I would have loved to see those boats see another around the globe, but they are a class that has not much support anymore, it seems.

In leg 6 the VO65s are back.

 

[Oxon]

I find it quite interesting that your routing is pushing the boats very south, I have been running same routings with expedition using Generic VO65 polars and scaled them a bit. Which works quite reasonably. But the route is way more westerly, but this is probably a difference in polars, but even more generic imoca virtual game polars are showing the more westerly option.

But it will be interested to see what the boats will do, stay around the same height as that small lp system and ride it west or dive further south towards the bigger LP and the associated front. With diving south you push yourself into last place and probably lose a lot of miles because you are sailing in way less breeze and going the wrong direction. Light winds shown in the image. But the chance of a better entry into cape town is mighty quite attractive for the crew, now the forecast for the high pressure ridge sitting there is quite rough.

View attachment 572807

If you are both using GFS and routing best practices, it largely comes down to the polar file. Try running your routings with polar % of 90-110 in 5% increments. That will show you how sensitive the routing is to the polar.

In the last 2 days, the optimum routings has really pushed south for the IMOCAS. Interestingly, this is what Will Harris predicted back 5-6 days ago, that some of their routings were taking them to 45S. I have no idea on what basis he was making those predictions....but they are looking more realistic as we get inside 7 days of the finish.

 

[3to1]

Here's some from 11th hr about just that- "The age old question of fleet racing is taking center stage: do you sail your own race or do you sail against your competitors?":

LEG 2: ONBOARD UPDATES - 11th Hour Racing Team

As the crew from 11th Hour Racing Team races from Mindelo, Cabo Verde to Cape Town, South Africa, we’re onboard with Amory Ross, our Media Crew Member, with live updates from the boat! Don’t forget you can track the fleet here. 📅 SunDAY FEBRUARY 12, 2023 🕒 0800 UTC 🌍 DISTANCE TO FINISH: 33.5...

www.11thhourracingteam.org

And here they talk about it a bit:

great vid, these guys are in a full war/combat mentality, but thankfully, their's no actual true violence.

 

[Varan]

Jibe, restack, jibe, restack... close racing with lots of maneouvers = very tired crew.

It does make this crewed racing interesting to follow.

 

[terrafirma]

Great to see Malizia back in the hunt. I wrote them off earlier and we know it's easy to pass from behind when approaching windless areas as you can see what the fleet is doing and where the best wind might be. Their boat speed has been good which is the main thing. Also good to see 11th Hour in the lead as they have worked hard with their new boat. Interesting times ahead.!

 

[Roleur]

Malizia absolutely steaming, 10nm more over 4h than second fastest 11th hour. Might even take the lead over night?

Not bad for a team that was all but written off in this thread just a few days ago

That's more a reflection of this thread than the boat.

Writing off boats before the equator, or when they were just 1nm apart. Seriously?

Can SiFi come out of retirement now?

 

[Varan]

Obviously, we all know Holcim-PRB are gonna win.

 

[Swanno]

Very interesting watching the speeds and angles. .
1 of a knot difference between 1 and 2
.1 of a knot between 2 and 3.
2 and 3 sailing at the same angle

4 currently doing 1 knot according to the tracker.

 

[TheDragon]

Jibe, restack, jibe, restack... close racing with lots of maneouvers = very tired crew.

It does make this crewed racing interesting to follow.

Worth noting that, once on this train, 11th Hour did just two gybes to get to the front, as did Malizia to get up to third, while Holcim lost the lead with 4 gybes, and poor Biotherm got shunted out the back doing 6 gybes. Obviously positioning and boat speed counts too.