One more night before The Hague

(June 10, 2023; Day 3) – The flying, foiling IMOCA fleet racing in The Ocean Race and the one-design VO65s competing in the VO65 Sprint both left Aarhus on June 8, their race starts separated by two hours.

And while the IMOCAs turned south to race into the Kiel Fjord in front of tens of thousands of fans the following day, the VO65s pushed north to a turning mark off the coast of Norway.

But today, the two fleets are coming together again, off the west coast of Denmark, as the 65s pass a turning mark, and the IMOCAs push south down the Danish coast.

And after their different routes, both fleets are making fast miles towards The Hague with an expected arrival tomorrow afternoon.

“We had Team Holcim-PRB in sight this morning. We did a nice job stretching on them last night but they’ve come back into us. But we’re in good shape, spirits are high, even if people are tired… but we will gut it out.”

There will be a lot of that happening. This is the shortest leg of the race and while it is too long – 800 miles, nearly 3 days – to stay awake, it is also too short for most of the teams to fully implement their watch systems. So there will be tired sailors arriving in The Hague.

11th Hour Racing Team and Team Holcim-PRB, the two leaders on the overall race points table, had made a slight break from the trailing trio but Team Malizia closed the distance this afternoon. A win into The Hague would give 11th Hour Racing Team a nice margin on the leaderboard heading into the last leg towards the Grand Finale in Genova.

In the V065 fleet, it is WindWhisper Racing Team continuing to hold pole position over Team JAJO and Mirpuri / Trifork Racing, although the racing here is very close – the spread between first and fifth is less than 25 miles.

“It’s been an interesting start to the leg,” said Pablo Arrarte, the skipper on WindWhisper. “We’ve had all kinds of conditions – upwind, downwind, reaching, light wind, a lot of wind. Luckily we are leading still…”

Both fleets are expected to finish tomorrow afternoon in The Hague, with the exact ETA still uncertain as conditions near the finish are not locked in with the weather forecast yet.

But a 10 boat arrival amid an extremely sunny and warm forecast in The Hague promises a fabulous spectacle for fans of The Ocean Race.

IMOCA Rankings at 22:15 UTC
1. 11th Hour Racing Team, distance to finish, 153.2 nm
2. Holcim-PRB, distance to lead, 5.7 nm
3. Team Malizia, distance to lead, 12.3 nm
4. Biotherm, distance to lead, 20.7 nm
5. GUYOT environnement, distance to lead, 27.3 nm

VO65 Rankings at 22:15 UTC
1. WindWhisper Racing, distance to finish, 168.7 nm
2. Team JAJO, distance to lead, 5.1 nm
3. Mirpuri Foundation Racing Team, distance to lead, 6.9 nm
4. Austrian Ocean Racing – Team Genova, distance to lead, 10.1 nm
5. Viva Mexico, distance to lead, 20.4 nm
6. Ambersail 2, Did Not Start

Leg 6: From Aarhus, Denmark to a mark at Kiel, Germany and then back up and around the top of Denmark to the finish in The Hague, The Netherlands (800nm)
Leg 7: From The Hague, Netherlands, down the coast of western Europe, though the Strait of Gibraltar and into the Mediterranean Sea for the finish in Genova, Italy (2200nm)

Race details – Route – Tracker – Scoreboard – Content from the boats – YouTube

IMOCA Overall Leaderboard (after 5 of 7 legs)
1. 11th Hour Racing Team — 28 points
2. Team Holcim-PRB — 27 points
3. Team Malizia — 24 points
4. Biotherm — 17 points
5. GUYOT environnement – Team Europe — 2 points

IMOCA: Name, Design, Skipper, Launch date
• Guyot Environnement – Team Europe (VPLP Verdier); Benjamin Dutreux (FRA)/Robert Stanjek (GER); September 1, 2015
• 11th Hour Racing Team (Guillaume Verdier); Charlie Enright (USA); August 24, 2021
• Holcim-PRB (Guillaume Verdier); Kevin Escoffier (FRA); May 8, 2022
• Team Malizia (VPLP); Boris Herrmann (GER); July 19, 2022
• Biotherm (Guillaume Verdier); Paul Meilhat (FRA); August 31 2022

The Ocean Race 2022-23 Race Schedule:
Alicante, Spain – Leg 1 (1900 nm) start: January 15, 2023
Cabo Verde – ETA: January 22; Leg 2 (4600 nm) start: January 25
Cape Town, South Africa – ETA: February 9; Leg 3 (12750 nm) start: February 26
Itajaí, Brazil – ETA: April 1; Leg 4 (5500 nm) start: April 23
Newport, RI, USA – ETA: May 10; Leg 5 (3500 nm) start: May 21
Aarhus, Denmark – ETA: May 30; Leg 6 (800 nm) start: June 8
Kiel, Germany (Fly-By) – June 9
The Hague, The Netherlands – ETA: June 11; Leg 7 (2200 nm) start: June 15
Genova, Italy – The Grand Finale – ETA: June 25, 2023; Final In-Port Race: July 1, 2023

The Ocean Race (formerly Volvo Ocean Race and Whitbread Round the World Race) was initially to be raced in two classes of boats: the high-performance, foiling, IMOCA 60 class and the one-design VO65 class which has been used for the last two editions of the race.

However, only the IMOCAs will be racing round the world while the VO65s will race in The Ocean Race VO65 Sprint which competes in Legs 1, 6, and 7 of The Ocean Race course.

Additionally, The Ocean Race also features the In-Port Series with races at seven of the course’s stopover cities around the world which allow local fans to get up close and personal to the teams as they battle it out around a short inshore course.

Although in-port races do not count towards a team’s overall points score, they do play an important part in the overall rankings as the In-Port Race Series standings are used to break any points ties that occur during the race around the world.

Held every three or four years since 1973, the 14th edition of The Ocean Race was originally planned for 2021-22 but was postponed one year due to the pandemic, with the first leg starting on January 15, 2023.