Race report two: all vessels racing east

Some of the vessels racing in The Tall Ships Races 2015 anchored overnight (Tuesday 7 July) or moored along quaysides in the Scottish Highlands due to the weather conditions, but no vessels have pulled out and all vessels are now racing east.  

Paul Bishop, Race Director, Sail Training International reports:

äóìThe group of Class A ships that headed deep into the Atlantic in anticipation of the wind backing into a favourable north west direction started to tack back and made good speed in the general direction of the finish.

äóìThe three Norwegian ships (Sorlandet, Christian Radich and Statsraad Lehmkuhl) continue to lead this group and it will be exciting to see which emerges with the race advantage over the next 24 hours. Statsraad Lehmkuhl has the greatest distance to sail to the finish line of this trio but she is in the strongest strategic position being the most northerly ship.

“t the time of this report most of the rest of the fleet had a challenging sail tacking into a northerly wind up the Minch. Spaniel (Latvia) has come out on top three miles ahead of her arch rival Tomidi (Belgium) which is just in turn ahead of Urania (The Netherlands) and Rona II (UK). Wyvern (Norway) is ahead on the water in Class B with Rupel (Belgium) and Belle Poule (France) some five miles behind her.

äóìWith the wind forecast to back further to the north west today it will be interesting to see how the positions play out as the north west group of Class A ships converge on the group that has sailed up through the Minch.äó

The interim position report at 0600 BST today (Wednesday 8 July) shows: 

Class A

1 La Grace (Czech Republic) 

2