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Volvo Ocean Race / Leg 5

Proof of the Pudding*

mercredi 13 mars 2002Information Volvo Ocean Race

As the girls are showing very good racing these days, it is worth looking at some of the crewmembers that make Amer Sports Too go fast and be a real threat to male campaigns that have had ten times the preparation time.

Teamwork is an essential quality for large yacht racing and is even more critical for all-female teams. When the chips are down, and things are going from bad to worse, a female team will bond together in a different way from male teams. Lisa McDonald and her crew on Amer Sports Too are up with the leaders after five days, on leg 5 of the Volvo Ocean Race and fighting hard on more equal terms, with less of the physical difficulties they will have inevitably encountered in the Southern Ocean. They are now able to show their combined ability on the Race course and this is the proof of the good sailors that they all are individually and how they are managing to merge their skills to good effect.

It will have been extremely difficult and soul destroying for Lisa and her team to come to terms with their results on the previous legs, especially seeing boats finish ahead of them when they knew that they themselves would have more days at sea. The last few positive moves in recent days, which have pulled them up to fifth place and in touch with the leading pack, could prove to be just the boost that the team needs.

As a team of sailors, they have all achieved in the male-dominated world of large yacht racing. Lisa has successfully competed in many international regattas, sailing with top male teams on Farr 40s and other Grand Prix yachts and was also part of Dawn Riley’s successful America3 America’s Cup America's Cup #AmericasCup Challenge.

Miranda Merron and Emma Richards first entered the public eye when they became part of Tracy Edward’s Royal & Sun Alliance team. With Tracy they sailed two-thirds of the way round the world attempting to break the Jules Verne Trophy record Record #sailingrecord before disaster struck with the dismasting of their catamaran.

Since then the two joined forces and have become interested in short handed racing. In 1999 they sailed Pete Goss’ Open 50 in the Transat Jacques Vabre Transat Jacques Vabre #TJV2015 sponsored by Pindar.

Recently Merron and Richards have opted to ’further their solo careers’. Merron, who lives in Hamble, now has her focus firmly on the 2004 Vendee Globe.

Eleanor Hay and Abby Seager are also regulars on the large boats out on the racing circuits of the world. Eleanor has competed on big racing keelboats in all of the major international races in more than ten different countries including Key West, SORC, Cowes Week, Cork, Fastnet, Heineken, and the Mumm Worlds regattas. She sails on the women‚s world match racing circuit with Whitbread Round the World Race veterans Katie Pettibone and Lisa McDonald.

Abby started sailing at the age of six, moving to racing dinghies before progressing to J24s and larger yachts. By the age of 18, she had logged many thousand ocean racing miles mainly in the English Channel and North Sea. Abby moved to Southampton in 1995 to study sports science, gaining more racing experience.

* = Proof of the Pudding is in the eating [English idiom]


Volvo Ocean Race Position Report, Day 5, 0958 GMT

- PS Yacht Latitude Longitude DTF CMG SMG TFHR DTL DTL-C ETA PO
- 1 TYCO 12 33.96S 035 43.60W 03697 015 10.4 257 0 +0 27 MAR 02 26
- 2 AART 12 34.76S 035 42.56W 03697 016 10.3 257 0 +0 27 MAR 02 27
- 3 ILBK 12 35.28S 035 42.84W 03698 012 10.3 257 1 +1 27 MAR 02 35
- 4 AONE 12 51.24S 035 43.60W 03714 013 09.0 242 17 +9 27 MAR 02 27
- 5 ATOO 12 51.88S 035 41.80W 03714 014 09.3 249 17 +7 27 MAR 02 11
- 6 DJCE 12 57.36S 035 44.92W 03720 011 10.2 237 23 +2 27 MAR 02 20
- 7 NEWS 12 51.68S 036 18.20W 03723 020 09.6 244 26 +6 27 MAR 02 21
- 8 TSEB 13 09.12S 035 39.24W 03730 015 10.2 242 33 +1 27 MAR 02 13


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