Whitbread Race: Leg 6
São Sebastião to Ft. Lauderdale
Leg 6 Starts Saturday; Cayard, Kostecki Return to Action
Leg 5 winner and race leader
EF Language.
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SÃO SEBASTIÃO, Brazil (March 9, 1998) — Race leaders Paul Cayard and EF Language return to racing on Saturday, March 14, with the start of Leg 6 of the 1997-98 Whitbread Round The World Race for the Volvo Trophy.
Cayard, the skipper and CEO of AmericaOne, says that despite his 96-point overall lead, he does not want to sail too conservatively during the the 4,750-nautical-mile passage to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
"We're going to be prudent, and there may be times when we reduce sail a little sooner than we might otherwise have," he says. "But the other side of the coin is that this is not just a sailing strategy. We now we have a machine that's used to operating in a certain way, and in a way used to winning, and you have to be careful not to get too conservative. You just have to go about business as usual."
Leg 6 is generally a warm leg and the competitors will experience the full range
of racing conditions, from high winds to no winds. The course follows the Brazilian coast, with its variable conditions, then the fluky winds in the Doldrums, followed by the constancy of the trade winds. The boats then pass the Windward and Leeward Islands in the Caribbean, then through the Bahamas before crossing the Gulf Stream to the finish at Ft. Lauderdale. The estimated date of arrival is April 2.
Follow Cayard's progress with his daily reports from EF Language posted here at the AmericaOne Web site.
Kostecki Returns
AmericaOne tactician John Kostecki is rejoining Chessie Racing for the remaining four legs of the Whitbread Race.
He previously sailed aboard Chessie on Legs 3 and 4, and was credited with boosting the American boat's performance to two third-place finishes. Chessie currently is in fourth place overall, just five points behind third-place Swedish Match and 12 points behind second-place Merit Cup.
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