VOR In-Port Race Cape Town

The 2nd In-Port Race in this VOR 2011-2012 will be sailing around the harbour of Cape Town. 
The Start will be on Saturday 10th December at 13:00 UTC - 15:00 local.  {this is 24 hours ahead of the Start of Leg 2 !}


This, if all hard work is finished, will be Race between 6 Boats. And a first event again for the 3 boats that had suffered major damage in Leg 1. 
It is almost guarantee for a challenging Race for the  Boats and an exciting spectacle for the visitors. The internet visitors, when not be able to be present, can see the spectacle via the internet. 

A 3-D race tracker is available on the VOR site
also a life video will  be available to follow each minute of this race on Livestream. 


I think it is amazing how little or none information is given on VOR web-site on starting times of events. Above information I read in a news article on VOR site only. I urge VOR webmaster to put the  starting times on the events,such that clicking on Schedule these can be found. 

Groupama has Finished VOR Leg1 in Cape Town.

GROUPAMA has Finished VOR Leg 1 as 3rd in Cape Town, South Africa. 

GROUPAMA finishing in Cape Town.     IAN ROMAN/Volvo Ocean Race

Elapsed time is 24 days, 4 hours, 28 minutes and 31  seconds. She earns 20 Points on this Leg; see the TAB VOR scoreboard for the complete summary of results. 

Groupama had a good start of Leg1, choose the route along the African Coast to the Canary islands, which looked promissing when passing  Gibraltar. However winds calmed and just North of the Cape Verde islands, Groupama change strategy to go West but saw all other sailing VOR boats passing her. After that , Groupama could never really catch up and some unfavorable wind systems in the Southern Atlantic threw her even further back. However, Groupama did finish in Cape Town, where 3 other boats failed to finish. 

Camper, 2nd to Finish, VOR leg1 in Cape Town, South Africa.

CAMPER 

2nd in VOR Leg 1. 

Camper on the last Nautical Miles before the Finish.

Some hours after Telefonica, it was Camper that Finished the 1st Leg of the  VOR on a good second Place. 
Campers sailing time for VOR Leg1 is :  22days,  14hours, 2minutes and  40seconds. 
In the Overall leader-board, she has earned 25 Points; and sits now in 2nd place. 

Telefonica, Winner VOR in Cape Town, South Africa.

CONGRATULATIONS to THE CREW OF TELEFONICA !!!

You have done it! Winner of the 1st Leg of the VOR (VolvoOceanRace). You have shown the capacity to choose a perfect strategy thus outclassing the other boats. 

Well , one Boat was able for a long time to sail up with you, but apparently they did not handle their boat properly and broke its mast. 

Telefonica, the Winner of VOR Leg1. 

Telefonica sail this VOR Leg 1 from Alicante to Cape Town in a time of  21days 5 hours 14 minutes and 25 seconds; she is earning 30 points for the VOR leaderboard. 

Approaching the Finish in Cape Town, South Africa.

On Friday early morning, the Boats are approaching Cape Town form the West. The First Boats, Telefonica and Camper, have less than 1000 Nm while Groupama has still over 1000 Nm to sail. 


Telefonica has the best Chances to the 1st Place, as she is leading the 3 boat fleet and has a location with a better wind angle; thus has a higher Boat-speed. 
However, Iker Martinez said it already, you win only when you have passed the Finish line. 

The image tells it all; PUMA suffered a broken Mast and receives some assistance of a container vessel.

Another victim of a Mast failure. 


PUMA has suffered a mast failure, while sailing in 23kts winds and wave heights of 8-10 ft; for sure not the harsh conditions that these Boats should be able to withstand and which will come to them later on the Southern passage to Cape Horn. Why is 33% of the fleet suffering from Mast failures? Would there not be too much compromise on proper and safe design for these Boats?


A BIG container vessel came to Puma's rescue and transferred some 500 ltr of diesel such that Puma can motor to Tristan de Cunha with some help of the jury rig on about 700 Nm distance. A further plan is made to transport Puma boat to Cape Town for repair. Hopefully the repairs will be in time, to start at the next VOR event: The In-Port Race in Cape Town. 

No Even Playing Field in VORG

Its now about a week and half sailing and the difference in capabilities of the Real VOR boats, the VORG boats on Options and the No Money VORG boats is becoming very  much clear. 


For a comparison, please see the map under the TAB Progress Map.


The fastest Boats are the VORG boats on Options, followed by the Real VOR Boats and the No Money VORG boats are now capable of producing the same speeds. 


The VORG boats on Options are about 100 Nm away from Fernando de Noronha. 
Puma, the leaders in the Real Boats is about 300 Nm away from Frenando and the first of the No Money VORG boats  is about 800 Nm away. 


So my fear is confirmed that the Winners in the Virtual VORG can only climb the Podium , because they have bought so many Options. These options like turbo sails, auto angle, waypoint scheduler and extra energy for their boat engine give so much extra's that even a poor sailor will be able to win from a good sailor that is using only the Basic features of the VORG boats, including the free credits; with do not give you e.g. the better sails package.


It is a pity for the VORG , that companies like VOLVO are so money hungry that they made the Game so much "off equal playing fields". Only the big spenders can climb the Podium :(

On the other hand the club of The No Money Sailors is growing by the day and  0$ sailors having a lively discussion and a lot of fun. 

No Money to Spend on VORG

The VOR has also made a New VolvoOceanRaceGame (VORG), a virtual sailing game, in which you can sail your own boat on the same Route as the Real VOR boats and match or maybe even beat their speed and strategical decisions. 

It is a virtual sailing game that is reasonably easy to learn and sail with. It is de-bugged to a great extend and runs well at the moment. Compared to other virtual sailing games like LiveSkipper or SailOnLine it still miss some essential features but you can at least sail your boat. 


There is one (1) LARGE PROBLEM : 

TO SAIL FAST 

WITH THE VOR BOATS 

YOU HAVE TO SPEND A LOT OF MONEY! 

So the Winners in the VORG virtual game can only be winner after purchases that helped them to gain from other less fortuned sailors!.

HOWEVER

You may also decide that virtual sailing is nice but need not to be that expensive. 

VORG is FREE as a basic game, and why to buy the extra's if you can sail with a group of other sailors that also have declared to sail for FREE and not to buy themselves up the podium. 

So join The No Money Group 

You find us look on Facebook under The No Money Sailors 

The Group is having some guidelines and a list of participating boats. There is a lively discussion on sailing tactics and some kind of progress chart. 

The first prize for the No Money Sailors will be somewhat older type of Volvo car. 

Good News on Repairs

The VOR is going steady but relatively slow for the 4 Sailing boats.

Groupama is the only boat that is following the West African Coast searching for potential starting trade winds. She has this morning the lead on the others with about 40 Nm.

The other 3 boats have headed West and hoping for stronger winds and a good place to confront the doldrums.

GOOD NEWS 1

Azzam the boat from Abu Dhabi is Sailing again!
During the first day of VOR , she was sailing in strong winds and high waves and unlucky broke her Mast. Back in Alicante the spare mast was mounted and since early this morning, Azzam is Sailing again, about 820 Nm behind the Leader. Will she be able to catch up with the other 4 boats?

RELATIVE GOOD NEWS 2

Sanya suffered a whole in the bow section of the hull. 

Sanya Lan, the entry from China has a repair plan that shows that she can be repaired and ready for sailing before the start of next Leg in Cape Town. 

The plan comprises of a transport to Gibraltar by truck, a transport by ship to Cape Town, departing late this weekend and ETA around 28 November. 

A new part for the damaged Hull  is being made and will be mounted in time in Cape Town.

Rough 1st Day

Just 6 hrs in the race, Abu Dhabi boat Azzam  broke her mast in three places. The boat was sailing in 30kts of winds  and waves said to be 10 m. hight. Luckily no crew members were injured by this accident  and the boat is motoring back to Alicante. A spare Mast has arrived in Alicante and I read that the Boat is hoped to be sailing again in 3 days.

Another casualty.

An image of the damaged Hull of Sanya Lan. She had to suspend the VOR last night and is now in the  harbour of Motril, Sp. to assess the damage and make a repair plan.

So after 1 day into the  race only 4 boats managed to sail through the Strait of Gibraltar to reach the Open Ocean , where the big winds and waves are waiting.

VOR has started!

The VolvoOceanRace as well as its Virtual player VORG has started, yesterday, 5th November 2011 at 13:00 GMT. 

Sanya Lan during the Start in Alicante. 

Strong winds accompanied the Start of the VOR in Alicante. First a circuit around  some buoys in front of Alicante Beach had to be sailed. 

In the strong winds, the teams had to work hard and  were struggling at times. Camper was the fastest around and  could as the first boat set sail to  Cape Town. The winds made  speeds upto 22+kts (as reported) possible and water was splashing all around.

During the night the first casualty happened already, Azzam the Abu Dhabi boat lost her mast, broken in 3 places. The crew is luckily unharmed and the boat has suspended the Sailing race and motoring back to Alicante to replace the mast. 

In the VORG it looks that many boats sailed away properly but also here some casualties as I read in news media that many sailors were not able to log-in. Gradually more and more joined and now I see already 46000+ boats participating. 

The boats are following the spanish coast and try not to loose too much height in the Western winds. 

Now sailing towards the Strait of Gibraltar ,which the first boats will pass later today. 

I have to look more in detail, but for now it looks like the VORG boats are sailing  faster than the real VOR boats :)

I am recovering from a bad nigt, where I could not make the required heading change and lost too much height. Also I will sail with the  basic sails only and thus  will loose out considerable speed over the boats that purchase extra sails and extra energy, most likely to use their engine.

For the route see the Tab Route above,

In the tab Progress Map I will try to indicate the daily position of my boat Paradise and of the 1st of the real VOR boats. On top of that I will  follow my boat sailing in LiveSkipper , just for comparison. 

WARNING

In short ONE HOUR the VORG will start in Alicante for the 1st Stage of the Round the World VolvoOceanRace. 

Hoist the Sails, but do not pass the Start line before time :)

VORG - Virtual Sailing in VOR

This weekend also a pre-race was sailed on the New Virtual VORG player. Route was from Alicante to the passage of the Mallorca and Menorca and back to Alicante.

The winds were NE , like for the In-Port Race, so it was a game of tacks at the  right moment to get the front of the fleet. The game worked alright, but I missed some decent sails and a W.P. for a good sailing in my night. Both  were to purchase, but me as pensioner will not go for that, so I will use only the basic VORG player and  see how many paying skippers I can beat.

A large discussion erupted as some skippers had a favorable approach to the 1st gate: from the SW to pass the gate line and return over the same gate line towards the Finish. This is a normal way of Sailing in most virtual sailing players like LiveSkipper or SailOnLine, but some skippers lacked this experience and started complaining, to their succes as the VORG race committee succumbed to these plea's. Anyway some of these clever experienced sailors were dsq'ed while others not?
Reason given by VORG  r.c. was, that the estimated path on the map showed the route around the islands; strange is however that none of the 10 declared winners followed this route on another island passage either.

A big controversy and I really hope that VORG r.c. will learn from this. Next Race Instruction shall be clear and explain in detail the requirements for the route without any ambiguity. Also it shall be made clear whether the route indication around islands etc, is compulsory or assistance only???

You can find the VORG in their own web-site.

Another BIG un-known for the VORG is still not solved:  
how much will this game cost?
The free player is very basic and for any modern virtual game feature they ask  money: some extra sail like Genoa and Code0, for the WayPoints, for auto-angle and even to buy extra energy !
Energy on a sailing boat? It looks like VORG has left the idea of sailing Green and is more promoting to use the motor. A real pity for this VORG.

You will be set back for each leg about $1000; comprising of an extra sail set for $250, a heavy weather sail set $250, the auto angle and auto sail features 2 times $150, some Waypoints at $20 each (or bought in volume it can be reduced), and candy bars for crew energy of $25 per candy bar, which could add with 30 days a leg and 6 crew members. The prices are now mentioned in $ but the game also speaks on credits, for the survival of the VORG I hope that the exchange rate is about 1:100 .

These purchase options have ruined the level playing field and it looks like you have to buy your place for the Podium.

The first VOR activities

Over the weekend the VOR started off with an In-Port race in Alicante.
It was a tight battle , with sad for some boat a DSQ for early starting.

A tight battle during the Alicante In-Port Race 

The ultimate winner was Abu Dhabi, CONGRATULATIONS. She is now also leading the leaderboard.

A video is available to enjoy it all once more : Alicante In-Port Race

This week will show some Legends events with some famous Sailing boats from previous VOR.