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Certainly a St. Valentine’s Day finish for Sam Davies’ would fit so perfectly with the Roxy spirit, but for the British skipper who has a home in South Brittany and has gained a huge fan base in France this race, her weekend, into Monday may yet prove to be a nervous countdown until the arrival of Marc Guillemot.
Predictions, albeit based on some slightly shaky weather and performance variables, still conclude that when the corrected times – net of redress compensation – are computed there could be just hours between the effervescent Roxy Chick Davies and Guillemot, and third could go either way.
Barton Marine, one of the world's leading manufacturers of sail control hardware has designed a special range of blocks and cleats specifically for a unique and innovative new catamaran.
Built in Austria, the Smartkat has inflatable hulls, which means that it can be stored in a bag when not in use and transported for quick and easy launch on the water.
Incorporating a unique patented rudder design, the Smartkat is extremely lightweight and fast, weighing just 42kg and capable of up to 12 knots, it is suitable for all levels of experience.
In the moderate downwind conditions they have been enjoying the differences in speed between Sam Davies’ Roxy and Marc Guillemot’s doubly handicapped Safran have not been too great.
The British skipper has had a good night pushing averages of 12-13 knots while Guillemot has been closer to the 10-11 knots and this morning is within 90 miles of Roxy in terms of distance to finish. As the low pressure to the north contains the high a little then they have been able to keep moving perhaps a little better than was expected, and a Saturday finish seems to be on the cards, although Davies considers that the final 200 miles late Thursday and Friday will still be slow.
The three teams that didn't finish leg four - yet (in one case) - are all working hard to re-join the Volvo Ocean Race as soon as possible.
For Delta Lloyd and Telefonica Black, it's all about shipping the boats to Rio de Janeiro, and completing repairs there in order to race in leg five.
In the case of Ericsson 3, it's a race against time to fix the damage to their boat, finish leg four, and start leg five; perhaps in time to race with the rest of the fleet.
The Big5Kayak challenge team have been training hard on the River Thames, the Great Ouse and also two of the team trained over Christmas on the West coast of Ireland. Weekends have consisted of longer paddling stints of 3-5 hours depending on location and conditions.
During the week the team have paddled in pairs either on the Thames or on the Great Ouse at Viking Kayak Club with shorter stints of 40 mins to an hour. The darker colder mornings have added to the challenge of getting up for a paddle at first light. Some motivation strangely has been drawn from beating the local rowing club star onto the water.
Bouwe Bekking may have been first to pop the cork on his champagne, but Torben Grael had the broadest grin at the end of the Qingdao in-port race.
Maybe he was just relieved to get the race sailed. After all, two consecutive days of cancellations is hardly ideal preparation for a 12,300-nautical mile leg that begins in less than a week.
More likely he was pleased to have followed up a first place in the day’s opening race with a second in the final session. It was enough to give Ericsson 4 the day’s spoils and grow their lead at the top of the leaderboard by half a point, leaving them four ahead of Telefonica Blue, who finished second after a fourth and a first.
Marc Guillemot’s Vendée Globe has been the most laden with very unexpected challenges and widest spectrum of emotions of any skipper left in the race. Now the skipper from La Trinité has a massive final test, completing the final 976 miles of his race on Safran without a keel.
Guillemot’s team reported early this morning that trouble with his keel which had been bothering him since the Azores had got worse. Since yesterday the keel had been moving in the fore and aft plane and giving the skipper cause for concern. Early this morning it had slipped several centimeters down into the keel box and he was forced to try to make a fix by securing it with ropes to the mast and a winch, but early this afternoon he realized suddenly that the ropes were slack. He no longer had a keel.
As the Louis Vuitton Pacific Series approaches the quarter finals, New Zealand is up in arms at the offhand treatment meted out to it by the Italian Alinghi team, already hardly the yacht racing world's favourite AC squad. The UK's Bob Fisher – one of the most respected yachting journalists in the world – penned a scathing article after Alinghi refused to race against Emirates New Zealand (ETNZ) team on Sunday 8 February.
Lewmar's new state-of-the-art V6 and V8 vertical windlasses have true super yacht appeal. Deck units are constructed from 316 stainless steel and offer the ultimate in strength to withstand high loads on vessels from 55 to 110 feet (17m - 33.5m). The V6 windlass is available as gypsy only and gypsy drum in left hand, right hand and remote chain pipe configurations. The V6 is available with 24V or hydraulic power option and a large range of gypsy sizes. The V6 has a cone clutch for smooth, easy control whilst anchoring.
New designs of canoes and kayaks plus marine electronics including handheld GPS chartplotters are among the great products on display from Johnson Outdoors UK at this year’s Show. From Ocean Kayak there is a comprehensive range of lightweight, fun sit-on-top kayaks starting at £299, plus a dedicated kayak fishing section with new models of the Prowler Trident 11 and 13.
There are the new Vapor 10 and 12 kayaks from Old Town (top right) which give a safe, stable ride and the spacious cockpit will take an adult and a child. Canadian style canoes include the reintroduced Discovery 119 which is agile and easy to handle. There is also the stunning Koru canoe (right) with a composite hull and wooden gunwhales and seats. For kayakers the Necky Manitou range has great lightweight tourers.