Throughout today, the wind is forecast to clock to the north and build as the deep low pressure system centred approximately 1,000 miles due west of the fleet rumbles eastwards, colliding with the coast of South America. For the race leaders this should mean fast reaching, but with Desafio Cabo de Hornos and Beluga Racer sailing over a sheer, submerged cliff face as the 4,000 metre deep Chile Trench rises to just 200 metres at the continental shelf, the sea state is likely to be fierce. For Team Mowgli and Roaring Forty, the prospects look equally tough, with weather models predicting a further rise in wind strength late on Thursday as the two boats close in on Cape Horn.
Despite being a very, very long way from home, an extraordinary mid-Southern Ocean coincidence turned Michel Kleinjans’ thoughts towards Europe with the arrival of Bouwe Bekking and his ten crew on Volvo Ocean Race entry, Telefonica Blue. “The Spanish Volvo boat passed a bit too much north for any photographs,” reported Kleinjans from Roaring Forty earlier today. “But I chatted to Bouwe on the satellite phone.” Bekking and his team are hamstrung by damage on board their 70ft boat, including a jury-rigged forestay, a cracked mast and a delaminating mainsail and Telefonica Blue is trailing the Volvo fleet. “We both did our first Whitbread Race the same year and Bouwe can’t remember how many times he has rounded Cape Horn since then,” continues Kleinjans. “It’s strange how lives reconnect and we end up in precisely the same place 23 years later. It felt really odd chatting away in Dutch out here, but very nice.”