Dongfeng notches another first
Print Edition
VOLVO Ocean Race leader Dongfeng Race Team yesterday became the first Chinese-backed crew to win an in-port race in the history of the 41-year-old event.
Last month, the crew had become the first from the world’s most populous nation to win an offshore leg, clinching the third stage from Abu Dhabi to Sanya, China. “Dongfeng means the wind from the east (in Chinese) and today the wind blew from the east — we’re lucky in China,” French skipper Charles Caudrelier said.
Caudrelier’s crew are protecting a one-point lead going into today’s fourth offshore leg start for the 5,264-nautical mile trip to Auckland, New Zealand, and this win leaves it third in the in-port series. The in-shore races do not count directly to the main offshore prize, which will be concluded in Gothenburg on June 27, but the positions will break ties. With the teams so evenly matched that could well happen so the one-hour in-port races are important.
Before the race started at 2pm local time, there were fears that the breeze on the island of Hainan, off the southern coast of China, would not be strong enough to race but it picked up to just over 10 knots a matter of minutes before the fleet embarked on the 7.2nm course.
The lead changed several times between early leader Team Alvimedica (Turkey/US) and Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, before Dongfeng edged clear in the fourth leg, sustaining its lead and winning with 38 seconds to spare.
British skipper Ian Walker’s Abu Dhabi crew claimed second ahead of Alvimedica and consolidated its overall in-port series advantage, now leading by four points. The fleet will now have a brief respite of just under 24 hours before setting out on one of the nine-month, 38,739nm race’s most testing stages through the South China Sea into the Pacific Ocean to New Zealand.
Dongfeng made four changes to its eight-strong crew for the fourth leg. The team has a game plan to blood as many of its six Chinese rookies in the crew as possible. That has led to two of the Chinese who helped them to Leg 3 victory from Abu Dhabi to Sanya — Liu Xue and Cheng Ying Kit — making way for Chen Jin Hao and Yang Jiru for the next stage from China to New Zealand.
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