The Ocean Race 2023 leg 3: Capetown to Itajaí, Brazil

[TheDragon]

ECMWF predicted wave heights now, tomorrow and Sunday.

 

[JonRowe]

Holy moly, have we ever seen footage like that? I was shaking just watching it. And indeed Malizia does not bury the bow. But how then are Holcim keeping up? and are the occasional bear-aways to recover the drone?

Probably by also not burying the bow, Kevin bought the boat which had originally been designed for this race and modified the bow, and he probably knows a thing or to about not burying bows...

 

[grandsoleil]

30+kn boatspeed drone footage. just wow

2:25: "This is playing with the children... let's see if the big chief is coming out of his bunk soon"

 

[TheDragon]

Imagine if they had not fixed the keel/foil noise

Imagine if they hit a whale, or even a large molamola

 

[LeoV]

Heli shots like this, yes. Self launched drone, not so much.

Noise levels seems way done onboard on this course.

 

[Qtrfoil]

Weather routing March 24th
ASCAT got lucky @ 0303Z this morning, see pic 1. A HP zone to the north of the fleet, and a LP close to Antarctica.

View attachment 581612

It seems that both wind models overstate the winds below the fleet. See pics 2 and 3. Highest winds as per ASCAT near the Chilean coast @ 40 kts, but that is only 1 wind barb.

Pic 2 ASCAT and ECMWF

Thanks so very much for all of these!

 

[M26]

he probably knows a thing or to about not burying bows...

and also how to fold them!

 

[landratte]

Malizia Dashboard working link

Unfortunately this one is called the "Route du Rhum" Dashboard and is working while the "Ocean Race Dashboard" is not. You can switch bewtween them on the top left. There are two more, but the only one working atm ist the RdR one.

There was a small gap yesterday but no "tactical" switch-off.

 

[ET1]

30+kn boatspeed drone footage. just wow

Good Lord maaan, I would be scared stiff if I was on that boat. And they keep doing this day after day

 

[landratte]

2:25: "This is playing with the children... let's see if the big chief is coming out of his bunk soon"

I hear she's saying "Big B". Which is even funnier - Big Boris comes out to admonish the children...

As Antoine said: it won't get better than this, Malizia flying full speed under sunny skies with rainbows forming in the spray.

 

[Herman]

2:25: "This is playing with the children... let's see if the big chief is coming out of his bunk soon"

Yeah, "big B" they call him too

 

[Herman]

Rosalyn Kuiper was earlier today interviewed on the Dutch National Radio station NPO1. She talked about 8 meter waves and 55 kts wind expected. Explained that the boat had been designed for this weather. She gave me the impression that TM is going straight for CH. I will reset the max TWS settings for TM from max 40 kts downwind to 50 kts.

 

[Qtrfoil]

Ok but her name is "Action!" Kuiper now!

 

[Potter]

Heli shots like this, yes. Self launched drone, not so much.

Noise levels seems way done onboard on this course.

Some interesting comments from them on board. Considering the intensity of the racing they genuinely seem to be spending a few hours having fun and 'sending it' a bit harder for the benefit of the filming...

Did you notice Will ask for 1 degree less keel, just before they accelerated to mid 30s?

Brilliant crew dynamic.

 

[jimmy_81]

Rosalyn Kuiper was earlier today interviewed on the Dutch National Radio station NPO1. She talked about 8 meter waves and 55 kts wind expected. Explained that the boat had been designed for this weather. She gave me the impression that TM is going straight for CH. I will reset the max TWS settings for TM from max 40 kts downwind to 50 kts.

Good luck to ‘em, and hope they’re triple checking absolutely everything.

Those drone shots… wow!

 

[D Wayne G]

I would not be surprised if this was tactics-related. I cannot remember Boris / TM doing so in the last races. But as this race will be about every mile of lead, the Grafana might be advantageous for the other teams (eg whether Malizia reach their target performance at their location). Although I cannot estimate the impact of that information. Enough conspiracy; maybe the board is just down for maintenance.

Given that they have each other on AIS I doubt there is much secrecy.

 

[dg_sailingfan]

I absolutely ADORE the Crew on Malizia. Such cool bunch of people.
Now to all the Teams: Please keep your boats in one piece, thank you!

 

[wildbirdtoo]

But looking a bit further @ March 25 12Z a new strong wind field is expected. GFS routes through this for 11th Hr and Biotherm. 6 m sig waves according to WW3. TM and Holcim projected to go straight east and then south along the Chilean coast. I don’t buy the latter, as you do want to keep a healthy amount of sea room to that coast and lee shore, say 50 nm or more.

For ECMWF and WAM the wx also drive the fleet towards the Chilean coast, I don’t buy that either.

P

Kevin mentions this (E and down the coast) as a route option in his latest video *(content from the boats). They are going to decide by "tonight" (their time) whether to take this slightly longer route - he says slightly less wind and waves, but longer. Priority is to get the boat & crew to Itajai in good shape, which will play a part in his decision on routing.

 

[dg_sailingfan]

@terrafirma
Must be quite a surreal feeling inside "Seaexplorer" (Malizia) with all the shattering and groaning inside the Boat.
Boris probably thinks every time the boat will surf down a 6M Wave it will break into thousands of pieces but he kinda knows that Seaexplorer was built for this.

 

[Liquid]

30+kn boatspeed drone footage. just wow

Clearly the heavy air, lots of rocker and bow up corner of the design box is confirmed!

It looked really stable.

3 weeks of the SO and only now, at the end, we get 'proper conditions'...