Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Puma & E4 round Cape Horn


Rick Deppe/PUMA Ocean Racing/Volvo Ocean Race
PUMA Ocean Racing, skippered by Ken Read (USA), celebrate rounding Cape Horn in third place at 20:46 GMT, on leg 5 of the Volvo Ocean Race

Guy Salter/Ericsson 4/Volvo Ocean Race
Ericsson 4 celebrate rounding in Cape Horn in second place at 14:48 GMT. Skipper Torben Grael, ticking the box for the second time, said: "Cape Horn for sailors is like climbing Mount Everest."

For the leaders, the treacherous conditions anticipated at the Horn did not materialize with wind conditions in the 25-30 knot range and moderate seas. On the final approach, Ericsson 4's Media Crew Member Guy Salter handed out plaudits to his stable mates.

The Ericsson 3 boys have managed to hold us off and fair play to them they played a good move early after the last scoring gate a move which none of the rest of us were as brave to play and go against all that is traditional with the NZ to the Horn leg.