Leg 8 - Galway to Marstrand

Rick Tomlinson / Volvo Ocean Race

It may have been one of the shorter legs of the race, but it was long on intensity. The leg threw a bit of everything at the crews, who were totally exhausted by the time they reached the finish off the small island of Marstrand.

The 1,250 nautical mile journey started with a furious downwind blast out of Galway in 20+ knots. It made for a spectacular lap of the sausage course set right off the beaches of Salthill, before the fleet headed west out of Galway Bay.

The route then took them south down the west coast of Ireland, passed inside the Fastnet Rock and then across the English Channel.

On arrival at the Hook of Holland, there was a small detour towards the shore where they completed a six-mile reaching lap about one mile off the beach near Rotterdam.

From there it was up to the top of the English Channel, into the North Sea and finally to the entrance to the Baltic and round the mountains of Norway to the north. This area, the Skagerrak, lived up to its reputation of producing unpredictable weather.

In one of the closest finishes in the race, Ericsson 4 held off PUMA and Green Dragon team to take the spoils.

It was Torben Grael's third consecutive leg win and fifth in the race to date. The victory gave Ericsson 4 a 15-point lead in the overall standings with three scoring opportunities left (for a maximum 20 points) before the finish in St. Petersburg.

The battle for second place, between PUMA, who made a late pass, and Green Dragon, was particularly close (less than a minute separated the pair), as was the fight for fifth, where Delta Lloyd stole past Telefonica Black just metres before the finish line for a 19-second margin of victory. All seven teams finished within one hour and 19 minutes.

PUMA's resurgence continued. Ken Read's men having posted two second place finishes in the offshore legs since Bopston, as well as their first win of the race at the Galway in-port race.

Their finish position on this leg was particularly sweet as the team appeared to be in danger of finishing in last place 24 hours out.

"The 'no-quit' in this team is beyond imagination," said skipper Ken Read, dockside in Marstrand. "We had every reason to quit and I think we're kind of stunned to be honest. 24-hours ago we were sailing with a triple reef and a number four jib, upwind in a gale, while the other guys were running down the coast."

PUMA was forced to split from the fleet after 'blowing up' one of their spinnakers soon after the Hook of Holland. PUMA sailed to the opposite side of a low pressure system, forced into that position by not having the sail required to sail the same angle as the fleet. They soon tumbled to the nether regions of the leaderboard.

PUMA were sailing in much stronger wind than the opposition, and pulling back the miles. But they wouldn't get past Green Dragon until both had reached the tip of Denmark and made their final turn for Marstrand.

The Ericsson 4, PUMA, Green Dragon, podium placing was the same as in the leg to Galway. And PUMA and Green Dragon finished with a couple of hundred metres of each other.

In fourth place was a disappointed Telefonica Blue. Combined with PUMA's second place finish, the result saw Bouwe Bekking's team surrender second place on the overall leaderboard to the American team.

Further back, Delta Lloyd stole a point from Telefonica Black just ahead of the finish line, the boats nearly overlapped as they crossed the line.

Ericsson 3 completed the leg in a disappointing seventh place.

After two poor legs, the Nordics were looking over their shoulders at Green Dragon, now just 5.5 points behind. Similarly, Telefonica Black is suddenly less comfortable with Delta Lloyd lurking just seven points adrift.

USEFUL DOCUMENTS

Download the Leg 8 course information (PDF 507kb)
Download the Leg 8 crew lists (PDF 80kb)

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