Bubb took the lead

Nick Bubb, skipper on Whittlebury Hall, is definitely the best and most aggressive starter in the Transat 6,50 Charente-Maritime/Bahia race. Saturday he once again won the start when the 70 boat strong fleet started on the second leg in the race. He launched a Code 0-like sail and powered in front of the whole fleet on port tack. He also won the start from La Rochelle over three weeks ago and he sailed in to a 5th on the all downwind leg.
The fleet came off to a 14 minutes delayed but clean start in the swell with wind on the nose as predicted. Corentin Douguet on E Leclerc-Bouygues Telecom and Sebastien Gladu on Armor Lux took a more conservative approach to the start. Douguet soon broke loose from the rest of the pack and chose not to skirt the coastline of Lanzarote together with them.
The decisions the sailors makes early in this race will be crucial, and already three hours in to the race the fleet was divided in two groups separated by 15 miles. The depression centred NW of the islands are moving fast. The routing alternatives predicted in the start are therefore numerous. One of the main scenario with the SW winds will be the African coastline. That’s not an ideal route considering all the piracy attacks going on in those waters.
In the next 72 hours we will be likely to see who has taken the best choice for the first weeks sailing. This race is 2.700 nautical miles so this is only the first of a number of choices the sailors have to make.