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Flat Calm over the Baltic SeaIntroduction17.06.2008 - A slow start to day five of the Archipelago Raid. 
© Th Martinez With practically no wind over the Baltic Sea the ninth leg of the Archipelago Raid was cancelled after two hours of sailing early this morning. The wind has picked up and the boats are now heading in good speed to Sandhamn in the Stockholm Archipelago. The courageous teams started the fifth day of the Archipelago Raid at a beautiful 03.00 sunrise from Rödhamn, Åland, to once again head over the open stretch of the Baltic Sea to the Stockholm archipelago. After two hours of sailing on a flat calm sea, the organisers decided to cancel the leg, tow the boats to the northeast part of the Stockholm Archipelago and start the next leg from Fejan island as soon as the wind picked up. The teams are now sailing to the island of Sandhamn in a good pace in 6-10 knots of wind. The French duo on Team Kalix is still in the lead. Tired but happy with their race so far, skipper Eric Proust comments: "We have had great conditions, it is a great race! There are some really interesting teams in the race; Team Thule is very good at navigating, RBSC Huysman is very fast upwind and X-Leisure is a bomb all the time!" Ellen MacArthur and Greg Homann, on BT, currently ninth, had a great start of leg 10 today speeding away in 10 knots upwind. Late afternoon yesterday the team had problems with their sail and had to stop to repair. They dropped to last but managed to climb to a 14th place of the leg. "We are really enjoying the race. There are a lot of tactics involved, which is interesting. We are not used to sailing this type of boat and we are learning a lot. And we are laughing a lot. We are tired but still laughing, which is giving us energy," said Ellen MacArthur in good spirits before the start in Fejan today. Tomorrow, Wednesday 18 June the race finishes late afternoon in the city of Stockholm. By the end of today's racing Conrad was pleased with Team BLUE Ocean's performance saying "It was a long day today - this morning we paddled for almost 5 miles before being towed the rest of the first leg. Once the wind kicked in, we had a good day though - we were the first team to reach two of the checkpoints and we almost won the leg final leg but were beaten to the finish by Team Thule at the final approaches. Time to grab some food now and get some rest before tomorrow's final day!" Team Scores at 1330 hrs GMT on 17 June 2008 |
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