Volvo Ocean Race 2001-2002

Leg 1

Lisa McDonald’s crew on Amer Sports Too had only been together for a week when they crossed the start line in the Solent and their lack of preparation became evident within minutes as they saw their spinnaker disintegrate before they had passed the Needles.

The opening leg from Southampton to Cape Town delivered the mother of all baptisms for the first timers as the Bay of Biscay kicked up an almighty storm, putting paid to Djuice’s mainsail, before the winds subsided almost completely to give them a quiet ride to the Doldrums.

Long periods of inactivity gave them plenty of opportunity to conjure up dastardly ideas to make life as miserable as possible for the crew who were making their first crossing of the Equator.

“The good thing is that talking doesn't slow the boat down so we spent most of the afternoon sitting on the leeward side of the boat listening to stories and making plans for the equator crossing,” wrote Dirk de Ridder on illbruck. On illbruck we have three guys who were punished by Grant Dalton on their equator crossing and he is getting worse as time goes on. I just hope that he hasn't forgotten about the sprayglue and Deep Heat on private parts four years ago when they reach the equator this time.”

The same thoughts were also occupying minds on Amer Sports Too.

”King Neptune came to visit three initiates on Amer Sports Too last night, accompanied by Queen Codfish and their able assistants. Eleanor Hay (GBR), Klaartje Zuiderbaan (NED), and Genevieve White (AUS) crossed the equator for the first time by sea and were put to the test by judge and jury. The answers were not up to par and the penalty was paid. A kiss to the flying fish straight from the stew slops, and a little more stew spread around for good measure.”

That done, imaginations started to work overtime and as ever, thoughts turned to food.

“Thai Chicken Curry was the meal for dinner tonight. Definitely my favourite as it is a nice number with a beautiful coconut red curry sauce with chicken, green beans and peanuts all served with jasmine rice (I have been at sea for too long). Now, all that would make this day perfect would be a beer and crawl into bed with my wife. Well there is no beer or wife so I will have to crawl into my bunk and be content with the soothing serenade of the squealing spinnaker sheet on the primary winch, the rattling of the grinders and the whining water ballast pump.”

Move over Ernest Hemingway!

The development of the Volvo Ocean Race 60 was geared to creating bitingly close contests and the first leg highlighted how evenly matched the boats were as the top five boats virtually drag raced most of the 7,350 nautical miles to Cape Town.

Dalton’s Amer Sports One led for much for of the leg, but in the last few miles calamity struck as Dalton reported two successive crew errors leading to the demolition of key reaching sails, leaving him floundering, then feeling deeply depressed as illbruck passed by to lead into Cape Town for a first leg win….by the tiny margin of two hours after more than 31 days of racing.

Dalton conceded on the dockside that illbruck’s preparation, which had involved three and a half years of training, an elaborate sail testing programme and more than $20 million investment, had put the Germans ahead of the game.

He was dead right. Not a single sail had been broken on illbruck. The sewing machine was never disturbed and there were no gear failures on the boat. The only problem had been a failure in accessing the internet after the SatCom B unit came off its mountings in the bow. But running repairs proved adequate and the all-important weather information continued to be downloaded, though as soon as ASSA ABLOY arrived, in fifth place, they promptly lodged a protest against illbruck for making illegal use of an internet weather site.

The protest was withdrawn after a three hour hearing, but as soon as that was over, they were protested again, this time by a race official who claimed illbruck had modified their propeller drive strut to include a weed cutting device. That protest was upheld and illbruck was fined £1,000.

Outside the protest room, controversy was raging with equal intensity. A disastrous navigational error on ASSA ABLOY on leg one brought skipper Roy Heiner’s competency into the spotlight and the management made a quick but shock decision to replace him with Britain’s Neal McDonald. Heiner was gutted and repaired to the mountains to decide what to do next.

“In the end I guess it is a product of the professionalising of the sport of sailing,” he said. “The stakes are higher, the pressures are higher and you have to do what you think is the best for performance and in the end it is a tough sport, but life goes on."

For McDonald, taking the skippers role for the first time in his career came as a mixed blessing. “It is obviously difficult circumstances and as a person, I am sorry to see Roy go and I have enjoyed sailing with him. The boat is where it is now due to Roy's efforts and input, and it's a difficult transition for me to make - I would be lying if I said I wasn't nervous about it. But from my personal point of view, clearly I am very proud and pleased to have confidence installed in me by our sponsors and our management team and I am looking forward to getting stuck in and getting the next leg organised.”

Leg 2

Within hours of the fleet emerging from the shadows of Table Mountain, the first problem was reported. It came from illbruck and was so serious that Race HQ went on standby for an emergency rescue operation.

“The bow seemed to be lower than normal and started taking waves more frequently,” the report read. “The boat got slower and slower and then we could not keep her going anymore. We eventually found an inspection port on the bow had come off somehow. The entire forward compartment was full of water and we had to stop racing. We started the emergency pump and started getting the water out, and bailed with buckets from on deck. It took nearly two hours to control the situation before we could start racing again.”

Three days later, Tyco was also in distress, after suffering damage to the rudder. They headed off towards Port Elizabeth to make repairs, but discovered the rudder and bearings needed completely rebuilding. The boat was taken out of the water and put on a cargo ship to Sydney.

“Team Tyco can definitely come back from this setback,” said distraught skipper Kevin Shoebridge.

“But we’ve got some work ahead of us. The job has become tougher and we can’t sustain a low placing again but we can definitely come back.”

Elsewhere, the thrill of riding the Volvo Ocean Race 60s through the Southern Ocean was starting to create a buzz across the radio network.

“The boat’s incredible. I’ve never driven anything like it in my life,” shrieked NewsCorp helmsman Barney Walker after they came within two nm of breaking Silk Cut’s 447 nautical mile record in 24 hours. A few hours later, Team SEB did smash the record, covering an amazing 457 nautical miles at an average speed of 19 knots, top ending at 34.8 knots.

While most the fleet were smokin’, Keith Kilpatrick on Amer Sports One was having some serious problems with stomach pains and vomiting. It was an intestinal blockage that could prove fatal if not treated. The boat was out of range for an airborne medical evacuation, but as his condition worsened, the supplies of morphine and antibiotics began to dwindle. The Australian Air Force and Maritime Rescue Coordination centre were called in to airdrop new supplies on board and Roger Nilsson, a qualified doctor, was charged with the tricky job of setting up an intravenous drip while the boat was doing 20 knots through a violent and freezing Southern Ocean. As soon as Amer Sports One reached safer waters, Kilpatrick was taken off and Dalton breathed a sign of relief.

Team SEB were also having their problems. Navigator Marcel van Triest learned his mother had died so, with the race office’s blessing, he dived off the boat as soon as they reached Eclipse Island and headed home. His team-mates were in the lead and as the miles were crossed, so the lead over illbruck increased and with 48 hours remaining, the two were neck and neck with Fanstone and McDonald on their tails.

After his first leg blunder, ASSA ABLOY navigator Mark Rudiger was anxious to make amends on the approach into Sydney, but again, he took a gamble which went disastrously wrong and having moved up into second place they slipped back to sixth.

It was a shocking result and Rudi took it badly.

“For myself, I misread the weather in some key instances, and took some larger risks to try and win rather than protect what we had. In hindsight, we could have stayed with News Corp and had a fighting chance at SEB. Instead we gambled and lost, and it pains me to see what the crew and management went through based on my decisions. Looking to the future, I will have to heal my own personal wounds and start focusing on how improve my performance for the remaining legs.”

illbruck put in a last minute spurt to cross the finish line first for the second time, a remarkable result bearing in mind their early problems. Team SEB came in shortly after and Fanstone took the final podium place.

In fifth place was Amer Sports One who created the biggest spectacle of the closing stages, much to Dalton’s embarrassment. His boat broached after crashing off a wave during a gale in the Bass Strait. As soon as they crossed the Opera House finish line, Dalton was taken off the yacht on a stretcher with suspected broken ribs and severe bruising. Crew described the scenes as ‘utter carnage’ but Dalton was slightly more matter of fact.

“I was in the galley area and I was suddenly launched into space. I broke the stove and the fitting that held it to the bulkhead and slammed into the side of the boat. Roger suspects broken ribs and maybe some internal damage. It is very painful when I breathe.”

03

Before the fleet set off for the third leg, the crews heard of the tragic death of Sir Peter Blake, who was murdered while on an expedition in the Amazon. Many taking part in the race had been inspired by Blake’s achievements in all forms of the sport and most had either sailed, worked or drank with him. The sense of loss was palpable and the racing fraternity in Sydney was cast into a gloom of the darkest proportions.

Three weeks later, after some had visited England for Blake’s funeral, the race resumed with a foray into the classic Sydney-Hobart race, characterised once more by challenging weather, and much more besides. In the early stages, the fleet were shrouded in smoke from the disastrous New South Wales bushfires, then later endured a spectacular water spout and stormy conditions off the NSW south coast, and then were forced to park up in Tasmania’s Storm Bay.

Knut Frostad on Djuice reported a serious leak which saw their bow compartments fill with water, in much the same way as illbruck’s had flooded on the second leg and lost four nm while crew bailed out.

Then Amer Sports Too reported a failure of a strop in the headstay, forcing them to drop all their sails in a bid to save the mast. They carried on, planning to replace the strop in Hobart.

Tyco heard they had been disqualified from the Sydney-Hobart after failing to contact ACS Race Control or Hobart Race control at Green Cape, which was mandatory under sailing instructions.

Things turned serious when SEB was forced to fit her emergency rudder after her main rudder became damaged and had to retire from the leg. Krantz was just relieved that his crew were safe.

“What has happened is very sad for us, but most important in a situation of this magnitude is ensuring the crew and the boat are safe,” he said. “In the prevailing conditions here, we would not venture to carry on racing with an emergency rudder.”

While all this was going on, McDonald was up front and keeping his head, despite being caught in the middle of the water spout. At Cape Raoul, ASSA ABLOY left the other yachts becalmed and sailed away from them towards the finish, but he admitted later that he had been alarmed by the twister.

“I was pretty scared. We were heading right for the middle of it and altered course to try and avoid it. illbruck was near us at the time and they did a slightly better job at getting out of its way. It turned straight towards us. I assumed it would go downwind and it didn't, it came across the wind and we were in the middle of it. I didn't know when it was going to stop. If we'd had the sails up, there was every chance that we would have had them just all whipped off.”

After a three hour pit stop in Hobart, they set off again for Auckland though the problems for Neal’s wife, Lisa on Amer Sports Too were more complicated than first thought after a collision with a whale damaged the rudder, on top of the forestay failure. Rather than a quick repair job in Hobart, they were faced with a longer stay.

“We have to now leave Hobart, go to the restart line for leg three, off the Iron Pot, and restart our race, before we can retire for a second emergency stop this evening,” explained Mrs McDonald. ”Until we lift the boat out of the water, we will not know for certain what is wrong with the rudder, but the rudder has been damaged, both on the leading edge as well as a significant crack on the aft edge going forward.”

The run to Auckland was, by comparison, plain sailing for most of the fleet and ASSA ABLOY kept up their cracking form by pulling to the front though Rudiger seemed distinctly nervous during the navigators chat as the fleet approached Cape Reinga.

“Hi, my name is Rudi... and uh...I'm a chronic gambler. Meanwhile, since this last gamble has paid off so far,” he joked.

In fact, down below, things on ASSA ABLOY had become a bit hairy. One of their key crew, Jason Carrington, had fallen seriously ill after collapsing on deck just after the Hobart restart. He was suffering from serious abdominal pains and fever and it was decided he should remain in his bunk, but the on board medic Klaus Nylof had his work cut out when two other crew also became incapacitated through illness and injury.

Rather than slow them down, these problems galvanised the remaining crew who all pulled together and stormed along to victory. It wasn’t long before McDonald had been given a celebratory ducking by his team-mates.

Dalton arrived in second place two hours later, but the battle for third place had tacticians on Tyco, illbruck and NewsCorp facing an east versus west dilemma. Tyco decided for a more easterly route ten nm from the finish and split, but illbruck decided to stick with main rival NewsCorp and let Tyco loose, which cost them a podium place and handed Kiwi Kevin Shoebridge a well deserved moment of glory in front of his home crowd.

04

Half way round the world, but only four tenths of the points awarded so far. illbruck was heading the leaderboard by three points over Dalton’s Amer Sports One, five points over Fanstone’s NewsCorp and six over McDonald. This tantalising position prompted a round of crew changes, more than 30 in all and it was the return of American legend Paul Cayard that commanded most the headlines.

He had been sacked from his Oracle America’s Cup team so joined Amer Sports One alongside Grant Dalton. Many were intrigued how the two skippers would get on. They were both used to being in charge and had their own ideas of how boats should be raced.

But Dalton seemed happy to have Cayard supporting him. “He's a fast driver, he's a great tactician, he has huge energy, he is a good motivator, he will be good for me. It's been a long two years for me and even though I don't feel tired I am sure I'm probably off the boil a little bit. He's got me working harder than I was expecting with nine days to go which is a good thing.”

Others were not so sure.

The Southern Ocean beckoned for the second time. Icebergs then Cape Horn to port. Even for the salty old seadogs, this remained a scary prospect and this time, the icebergs were bigger and more frightening than ever.

Even before the first sightings were made, Krantz was back in the wars on Team SEB.

First of all, he had to explain to his six year old daughter why he was back in sixth place.

“I made a phone call to my six year old daughter Emma this morning and explained that I missed her. ”She answered by asking in what position we were. I tried again to talk about how much I looked forward to seeing her. She responded by asking if we were still in the lead. I realized I was trapped and admitted to her that we had lost the lead. Again she would not let go and asked in what position we were. I told her that we had lost out to a few boats and were now in sixth place and then, I added that I hoped to see her very soon. “There was a short silence and then she said, ‘Daddy, could you please get some speed on that boat?’”

A week later, Krantz had more calls to make after the rig on Team SEB came crashing down in fierce winds and freaky waves. Everyone was safe, but the feeling on board was one of deep disappointment.

“I guess this is the toughest mail ever,” the skipper wrote. “Tears were not far away, when the whole thing 'was over', and we had a little time to reflect. It certainly is a sad day for the project and all individuals working so hard to do their best. The race for a top spot is over. We now have to concentrate on getting good results in on the legs and see how far it takes us. What has put us in this situation? Was it gear failure? No. Just too much wind at one stage in combination with really bad waves.”

By then, all the boats were worried for their own safety due to the overwhelming amount of ice in their paths.

“I openly admit that I was seriously worried and on occasions really scared,” admitted Ross Field on NewsCorp. “We were quite fascinated by the first iceberg we saw, but after we were seeing icebergs the size of major islands, we knew we were in deep trouble. We kept hammering on but I was seriously, seriously worried.”

He wasn’t the only one to admit his fears.

“It was the most hair raising experience I’ve ever had and I’ve had a few,” said Mark Rudiger. “I’ve aged more than a few weeks.”

Some reckoned it had become too dangerous.

“They put chicanes into F1 races and there ought to be a chicane in this leg because the boats drove so heavily into the ice for advantage that it is really lucky that we didn’t lose a boat,” said Dalton.

The skippers had been offered a waypoint, it later transpired, but after looking at shipping reports and satellite pictures, had declined thinking it would compromise them. As it happened the information had been misleading. There was ice everywhere and many vowed they would never return.

illbruck was first to round the Cape, having sailed an immaculate leg thus far and Amer Sports One, NewsCorp and Tyco followed behind them.

“We finally passed the Horn this morning at dawn,” wrote Kostecki. “It wasn't the typical type of sailing you read about as kid....gale force winds and rough seas. We had 20 knots running with a spinnaker and a mild seaway. The sky was clear and the sun was just rising. What did we do? Some of us smoked cigars and we had a team photo with the famous Cape Horn in the background. Everyone was extremely happy to see Cape Horn as we passed only one nm away. Most of us waved goodbye to the Southern Ocean as we turned the corner and headed north.”

On St Valentine’s Day, which saw crew from just two boats send messages back to their loved ones, the chaps on NewsCorp had their hearts broken when they became the fourth Bruce Farr yacht to see their rudder snap off and float away after racing almost 6,000 nautical miles. To make matters worse, their transom also cracked, but despite all this carnage, they refused to give up, effecting repairs that made them look more like a Heath Robinson contraption than a state of the art racing yacht.

As the fleet headed north to Rio, illbruck’s lead started to evaporate, at one point losing 25 percent of her lead to Amer Sports One in just six hours. It set up a thrilling finish and in his emails back to base, Cayard was animated.

“Another beautiful day in paradise out here,” he wrote before delving into day-by-day detail. “After being out here for three weeks, you realise you have forgotten about what is going on in the world. The Winter Olympics would have started by now... maybe they finished. I don't know. Where is Osama [bin Laden]? Is that still a popular subject? Probably for G.W. But the real question is, ‘Who is winning the Star Masters Regatta in Miami?’ On a final note, I want to say that my sailing with Grant Dalton has been excellent. He is a great leader...strong but fair, fun personality, decisive and humble. He also knows how to lead by example, which is key in any project. The finish of this leg may be tricky and the outcome may depend a bit more on luck than skill. Let's face it, illbruck deserves to win the leg, but sailing is not always straightforward. What is important for the Nautor Challenge is that we are 3/4 of the way around the world and less than half the points have been awarded and my feeling is that this boat and this team can win it all. That is excellent, all things considered. It seems like we have just sailed a long way but the race is far from over.”

After almost 7,000 nm of racing, the five leading boats were locked into the tightest of battles as fickle wind conditions off the Brazilian coast turned wise old heads sore. It was Djuice who saw an opportunity away from the fleet.

They moved inshore and found a gentle north easterly breeze while ASSA ABLOY and Tyco struggled in no wind at all. This propelled them into second place behind illbruck, which was precisely the order they crossed the Rio finish line, giving them their first podium place in the race and putting more space between the overall leaders and next placed Amer Sports One. Dalton and Cayard could do no better than fifth, which was perhaps the biggest shock of the race so far.

05

Possibly one of the hottest legs on record started with yet another drama, involving….wait for it…..Kostecki, who was fast gaining a reputation for having a crisis early on in the leg then going on to win it, and Krantz, back on the water with Team SEB after having a new mast fitted.

On the way out from Rio, Team SEB tried to duck under illbruck's transom, but missed and went ploughing into the German boat. No one was hurt but illbruck’s hull was left with a hole in it the size of a fist, scratch marks down the side and no aft stanchion or guardrails. The hole was filled before dark and Krantz had no option but to put his hands up and admit to the bizarre mistake.

“The problem was probably miscommunication maybe or something that went wrong. We just did our 720 and continued racing. We’ll look into it further down the track,” said Gunnar.

Kostecki, meanwhile was fuming since he was forced to slow down to make repairs. But in good illbruck tradition, it made little difference and he was soon back up front.

The heat was unbearable and every email carried plenty of detail highlighting their discomfort.

Said Roger Nilson on Amer Sports One, “Sleeping is very, very difficult. Only at night time can you sleep. At the moment it is the coolest time of day and it is 32 degrees. At the hottest time yesterday it was 37 degrees below decks.”

Nine days into the leg and the three leading boats had cleared the Doldrums, where black clouds and shifty winds had proved frustrating. Then they headed into the Trade Winds which should have made things more interesting but didn’t.

“With about 2,100 nautical miles to Miami we are locked into the north east trades and the sailing has become a bit boring,” Nilsson said. “Often your best job is sitting on the rail to improve speed, but there is not much for the navigators and tacticians to do.”

Knut Frostad had a novel idea for making the boat go faster.

“To save weight I have been considering the idea that Internet viewers could vote one person off the boat every day,” he explained. “This might be risky as I realise that throwing the skipper in the drink is probably the most enjoyable for all, but at least we will be very light by the time we reach the Caribbean.”

With the fleet divided into two, all eyes were on the Amer Sports boats. Dalton had earlier claimed that if he was ever beaten by the all-women’s crew, he would ‘run naked down the streets of Auckland with a pineapple up my a**e.’. Dalton was challenged closely on this leg by McDonald’s crew on Amer Sports Too and when navigator Miranda Merron put out the historic announcement that they had edged ahead of the boys, there was much sniggering among the fleet. The girls soon fell back, but were enjoying their best performance to date.

On illbruck, the medic felt it important to carry out a series of checks. “The spot check has started, meaning that any suspicious spots on a crewmember's body are thoroughly checked out to make sure they do not fester into a nasty boil. If there is one, then copious quantities of nappy cream and baby powder is applied to try and curb the sore. The bonus here is that down below deck is starting to smell more like a nursery than a locker room.”

For most of the leg, three boats, ASSA ABLOY, Tyco and illbruck, swapped places at the front, but it was McDonald’s boat that arrived first in Miami, a perfect set of sails providing an extra yard of pace over illbruck, which had seen its light wind spinnaker go overboard three days previously.

This was ASSA ABLOY’S second victory and established them as illbruck’s main opposition with five legs still to race.

“Sailing side by side with ASSA ABLOY and Tyco, it was very noticeable that they were similar in speed,” said Kostecki, starting to sound a little anxious. “They really have copied our sails and a lot of things that we have learned. We thought we had an advantage, but now, they're catching up. It's going to be a tight race for all the rest of the way around the world.”

06

The first of the short sprints started with inexplicable errors as six of the eight boats crossed the start line before the cannon had sounded. They had to return while the smug McDonalds, on ASSA ABLOY and Amer Sports Too, sailed away on the 875 nm trip to Baltimore, knowing they had a tricky time ahead in Chesapeake Bay with its fickle winds, complex currents and lobster pots set to sort the men (and women) from the boys (and girls).

By day three, Fanstone on NewsCorp had moved ahead of illbruck and ASSA ABLOY, but it was nip and tuck between the first three boats with less than five nm separating them. The next day, Amer Sports One had joined the fray and right to the finish the skippers sat back in a flat calm and waited for Lady Luck to hand out her brakes and throttles.

Sails were flapping, but sails on NewsCorp seemed to flap a little harder than the others and Fanstone managed to complete his first victory of the race, an extra cause for celebration on Ross Field’s birthday.

“We didn't know we'd won it until we crossed the line,” said Fanstone. “We flapped our sails better than the other guys and our flapping paid off – good flapping.”

In Rio, many had thought Kostecki was unbeatable, but with three legs to go the race was as wide open as it had been after the first leg with ASSA ABLOY, Amer Sports One and NewsCorp running into some serious form. illbruck led by just seven points.

“We don’t need them to suffer a disaster to beat them, we just need to be better than them,” said Jason Carrington, now fully recovered on ASSA ABLOY, while Dalton vowed to stay on the podium, whatever it took.

07

Heading out into the ocean again, skippers were distinctly nervous as they realised how one small tactical error could make or break their chances. Before they made their break into the favourable Gulf Stream, they had to negotiate Chesapeake Bay, famous as one of the most demanding obstacle courses in the world with the flood tide, shallows, fish traps and crab pots all contriving to slow the boats down stop them in their tracks.

They emerged without incident and by the third day, Kostecki had worked his way to the front and was ploughing through the waters like an express train. Powered by 25-30 knots of winds, they realised they were in with a chance of setting a new record and 24-hours later, they had it in the bag. A massive 484 nautical miles.

“When we saw that we had a 127 nm run in six hours we then started to do the math and realized we had a good shot at breaking the record,” said Kostecki, who was chuffed to bits. “We did not try to break the record either. It just happened. Our goal is to win a podium finish on leg seven, so we are fully focused on the goal at hand and not breaking records. We broke the record by pushing the boat hard in favourable conditions.”

While the boys on illbruck were celebrating their good fortune, the unlucky girls on Amer Sports Too were facing total wipe out.

Just over 400 nm from the coast of Canada, they heard a loud bang and watched the mast topple over, just above the second spreaders. It left just 10m of the structure still standing. Fortunately no one was injured and the yacht was not in danger. The girls recovered the rig and sails and lashed the mast to the deck.

"We're all gutted, everyone wants to do well, and we had high expectations for this leg," said Lisa McDonald, in some distress.

They headed to Halifax in Nova Scotia, where the boat was to be transported back to the UK to be repaired before the start of the eighth leg from La Rochelle to Gothenburg.

But it was a race against time as the weather closed in and gales made the job of picking up a tow from tug Edward Cornwallis a perilous affair which, the girls said later, was far more frightening than the dismasting.

Shoreside, the phone wires were buzzing as representatives from Nautor Challenge, managers of both the Amer Sports boats, made arrangements for repairs and transport so the boat could be on the La Rochelle start.

There was flu on illbruck, yet they continued to blaze a trail. The Code zero sail blew out on Djuice and flew away and Tyco lost two reaching spinnakers which deprived them of some vital pace in the closing stages. While the result was inevitable early on….another win for the Germans, there was a riveting battle for second as McDonald and Shoebridge played cat and mouse all the way to the finish line.

It was McDonald on ASSA ABLOY who came out on top and while he was fairly happy, he would have been happier with an out and out win “We would have liked have been coming in here first, but we couldn't quite manage that. illbruck sailed a faultless race. They had speed and they got the better of us, so we haven't made it easy for ourselves, but we are going to keep fighting to the end. We need a bit of luck on our side, and a bit of bad luck for illbruck, but other than that we will just have to take it as it comes.”

ASSA ABLOY were eight points behind illbruck but with 16 points still up for grabs from the two remaining legs, there were still a chance of pulling a rabbit out of the hat.

Seeing illbruck perform at such high levels, when most the crew were stricken with flu, must have been depressing for the other crews.

Amer Sports Too left Halifax on a ship for Europe, giving Lisa McDonald's crew ten days to step a new mast and prepare for the start of leg 8. Against all the odds, they completed the repairs in Gosport and sailed for La Rochelle, but the wheel of fortune continued to spin resolutely against them.

"We're battling Mother Nature at the moment." explained Lisa, as she and her crew sailed towards France. "There's a big storm looming off Ireland and we are hoping to get around the corner of Ushant before that storm comes through late on Monday."

When they arrived in La Rochelle, having been battered by storms, they were given a rapturous welcome, as fellow crews and the public turned out to acknowledge their bravery and gutsy determination.

08

Whether it was nerves or navel-gazing, the crew on ASSA ABLOY were strangely off form at the start of the eighth leg and managed to snag the start buoy line around their keel.

Jason Carrington stripped off and jumped over to free the line from the rudder, but when the boat shifted direction, they realised the line was caught around the keel bulb, not the rudder. Richard Mason was also sent overboard, but he decided to swim to the trailing mark and cut the anchor line off the mark rather than risk a deep dive in the busy waters.

This all took about eight minutes and the commotion was noisy and frantic, but eventually the boat moved off, having been required by the rules to execute a 360-degree penalty turn for hitting the mark.

The penultimate leg was due to take just five days, but the first night will stick in the minds of the crews as one of the most unpleasant of the race due to the huge swells in the Bay of Biscay, combined with 40 knots of breeze on the nose.

“We have had a tight race since the start and we are soaking wet after a slog to this left hand corner. Very unpleasant conditions have resulted in some of the crew spending time on the white telephone to god,” Matt Humphries reported with unseemly glee on NewsCorp.

Amer Sports One was the first yacht to round Ushant and all yachts were round within one and a half hours, ASSA ABLOY going round sixth. In the English Channel, they fanned out, choosing their own routes to minimise the effects of adverse tides and the hurly burly mass of ferries, cargo and container ships.

There wasn’t much to pick between their different strategies and each time the position reports were updated, the leader had changed. If they stayed so close together all the way to Gothenburg, ASSA ABLOY was in with a chance of seriously challenging illbruck for the overall top position.

But with 400 nm still to go, the boat slowed down for no good reason.

“We checked the foils, and could see some things on the keel,” explained Rudiger. “All hands on deck. Our swimmer Richard Mason in wet suit just in case, spinnaker down, full head to wind back down. Nelly [Neal McDonald] pulled it off perfectly and in minutes we were bearing away again and putting the spinnaker back up. Even though perfectly executed, SEB shot on by and illbruck almost overtook us. From first to third and almost fourth. Magnus [Olsson] came up on deck shaking his head, and exclaimed in his drawn out Swedish accent 'you won't believe what was on the keel.' Everyone looked around waiting for some one to guess. 'Three big fishes,' he laughed, spreading his arms as far as he could.

"We all looked suspicious of another Magnus Olsson fish story, but Richard and Sidney [Gavignet] confirmed having watched through the scope. I had to agree that looking at the performance factor on the graph, it went up six percent. So now after 48 hours of giving everything for a few boat lengths, it's back to the grinder for more boat lengths to gain back.”

Kelp and fish were the skippers main headache on this final leg as vital time was lost on back downs, but it was a problem that affected everyone. Along the south coast of England, some of the boats were close enough to the Isle of Wight to spot the white rocks of the island's coast.

"Some of the Poms on board are glad of the sight of old blighty off the port bow, some even twitching at the thought that we were within 55 nautical miles of the Pier View in Cowes and could almost taste the beer,” said Campbell Field from NewsCorp.

At the entrance into the Gothenburg archipelago, ASSA ABLOY, Tyco, illbruck and NewsCorp were still within a mile of each other. With two nm to go, after 1,000 nautical miles of close, cut-throat racing, it was McDonald who made the biggest impression on the sandbars, close in shore to avoid the tide, even though Dalton allegedly put in 47 tacks over that distance, in 25 knots of wind.

McDonald kept up the pressure right to the finish and chiselled out a victory in the last few seconds. The top five boats crossed the finish in a remarkable six minutes and 50 seconds in what was the most thrilling finish in the history of round the world racing.

A win for McDonald was the perfect result, since it meant there was still a chance that illbruck could be beaten overall if ASSA ABLOY posted another victory in the ninth leg from Gothenburg to Kiel and if illbruck came in fifth or worse.

It was a big if, but this uncertainty created a storm of interest.

09

There were some radical moves to optimise speed, including some wholesale crew flicking. Fanstone dropped two, Frostad three, Shoebridge one though Kostecki was unwavering in his selections. Same crew, as it had been from day one.

Inside, the boats were completely empty, with anything that wasn’t needed by the rules taken off.

There was pandemonium at the start with 2,000 spectator boats making life supremely tricky for the skippers who were confined to a narrow channel. McDonald almost collided with a spectator boat and then promptly parked up in a windless zone. Disaster. ASSA ABLOY was sixth, five places behind the leader djuice, who was four nm ahead of illbruck and 29 nm ahead of Tyco at the back of the fleet. The girls in Amer Sport Too were fourth, but most important of all, they were ahead of the boys in Amer Sports One. Everyone was hoping they could maintain that lead to the end because everyone wanted to see Grant Dalton walk naked up the street with a pineapple up his a**e.

The course was shortened so the race would finish in daylight and djuice brought some romance into the tale at the 11th hour by winning the leg, Frostad’s first victory of the race.

illbruck meanwhile came second and won the race to take the 2001-02 Volvo Ocean Race Trophy having posted four wins, two seconds and three fourth places and the most points. ASSA ABLOY was six points behind, but McDonald and Rudiger were pleased that, after the disastrous first leg, they came back with such intensity.

“We all have mixed feelings about the end,” said Rudiger. “We're all ready for closure, and to stop moving from boat to hotel to boat etc. But we'll also miss the race, the singular focus, the awesome sailing, and the achievement. For us especially it has been fun moving up the leader board and proving our worth to our sponsors, shore crew, and friends and family.”

Jez Fanstone, skipper of NewsCorp brought up the rear rueing his decision to go west of Anholt Island. He finished fifth overall. “It's been torture,” a glum looking Fanstone said on the dockside. “After 32,000 nm of ocean racing, it comes down to a buoy-filled lottery to a certain extent. But all credit to the Amer Sports One guys, they did a nice job and they got a result and hats off to them."

Amer Sports Too took the wooden spoon after a courageous effort. Despite all the late and chaotic preparations, Lisa McDonald’s crew defied the odds to complete the course, battling with the worse of the elements and the sharp end of lady luck’s cruel wit.

Dalton finished his sixth round the world race with a pineapple stuffed down the back of his trousers…. spikes an’ all.

The girls loved it.