Violent waves with gusts of up to 60 knots greeted the crews on 25 February, day seven of leg four of the Volvo Ocean Race. All six yachts had successfully passed the first ice gate and were in full flight towards the second ice gate, just 78 nautical miles ahead for race leader, ABN AMRO ONE (Mike Sanderson).

The first three boats, ABN AMRO ONE, Pirates of the Caribbean (Paul Cayard) and movistar (Bouwe Bekking) were separated by just 26 miles, while ABN AMRO TWO (Sebastien Josse) found themselves last by 224 miles, a position they have, so far, been unaccustomed to.

“Any feelings of frustration over our position have been replaced with a fire in my belly and an overwhelming desire to kick some ass,” wrote a determined Simon Fisher, the navigator on the Dutch boat.

On day eight, the fleet passed the second ice waypoint and headed south towards the icy wastes of Antarctica on the penguin route, as Bouwe Bekking dubbed it. A fine battle was developing between the leading three boats and The Black Pearl squeezed a lead of just two miles ahead of ABN AMRO ONE, with movistar 14 miles behind in third. The sailing was fast and tactical as the fleet roared around a massive high pressure system, being chased by a huge low and the leaders formed a line along the leading edge of the front, hoping to ride it all the way to Cape Horn.

For those at the front of the fleet, it was the best of times, but for those at the back, as ABN AMRO TWO was, then it was the worst of times. Their consolation was to hit the mythical 40 knots of boat speed barrier.

By day nine, the fleet was careering south at breakneck speeds. Mike Sanderson (ABN AMRO ONE) was in a dilemma: “How hard to push? What are the other guys doing? Is going as fast as movistar was in the last sked [position report] good enough to hang on? Wait a minute; we don’t have to beat them in this leg, nor the other teams either. We just have to keep this thing in one piece… but there are 3.5 bonus points waiting at Cape Horn for the leader… those points would make our lives a little easier… but what if we push too hard and break?”

Movistar was just revelling in the true southern ocean conditions. They covered 140.8 miles in one six hour period, averaging a speed of 25.5 knots. “Just ripping the miles, this is what we love to do,” wrote an elated Bekking.

Ericsson Racing Team (Neal McDonald) wiped out in a Chinese gybe but made a remarkable recovery and no bodies or gear were damaged, prompting navigator Steve Hayles to write: “It’s been the hardest 24 hours of the race for all us, and the brutal facts are, that with 2000 miles to Cape Horn, this sort of drama is far from over.”

ABN AMRO TWO tore a metre-long hole in her mainsail, the crew painstakingly repaired it and then ripped it again. “Right now it may as well be made of newspaper - at least we would have something to read,” wrote Simon Fisher.

Onboard Brasil 1 (Torben Grael) Knut Frostad suggested that a call to the health and food authorities might have been a good idea. “Can someone please remind me, in four years from now, that I really don’t need to do this any more. I do really like a big, warm nice bed and dry clothes, and I do love nice food… it’s true, I do! Why are you laughing and thinking ‘idiot, you said this four years ago.”

As the teams looked forward to rounding Cape Horn in three day’s time, the weather was grey, damp and foggy. Full face masks were worn by everyone to keep out the constant fire hose of icy water coming over the deck, making it impossible to see. The sea temperature dropped and it was feeling very, very cold. The heater broke on Ericsson Racing Team and everyone onboard was cold and tired.

Even taking all this into account, Paul Cayard on second-placed Pirates of the Caribbean said that these were the richest days of sailing that he has ever been given. “Being at sea, traveling extremely long distances and circumnavigating the planet earth are bigger than life experiences for almost everybody and I appreciate being one of the few hundred people who get to do it,” he said by radio. The order in the fleet remained unchanged and everyone except third-placed movistar, made gains on the leader as the wind went lighter.

Nerves were on edge by day 10, February 28. Cape Horn was now just over 1100 nautical miles ahead of the fleet, and with 3.5 points on offer for the first boat to get there, it was an anxious time onboard. A new weather system was approaching from behind the fleet and it was moving only a little quicker than the leaders. It was an ideal situation for Ericsson Racing Team and ABN AMRO TWO to make gains and it became a drag race south. By day 11, the fleet had closed together and the crews were beginning to cover their opponents.

The fog had gone, replaced by crisp dry air and although the fleet was able to keep pace with the front, the weather was forecast to deteriorate and the winds increase to 35 knots. It became a ‘torture by numbers’ as the boats made gains and then losses to the leaders as the wind increased.

“A simple number like -6 can quite literally affect how you feel physically,” explained Steve Hayles from Ericsson Racing Team. “You stare at the screen in disbelief as you feel your shoulders tension up, but after a few minutes you realize that there is no asking for a recount, or having a second try. That six hours are over and you lost 6 miles; end of story.”

Day 12 and the fleet was preparing to enter some of the most hazardous waters in the world, a place where the southern ocean is at its shallowest and the winds funnel at 40 knots. This would be the exit of the southern ocean and the experience could be dramatic or benign. The fleet just had to wait to see what the weather Gods would decide to throw at them. The Gods chose movistar to be their victim.

At 0315, March 2, in 30 knots of wind and a big sea, Bouwe Bekking reported that movistar was taking on water at a high rate and requested that the boats nearest to her, Brasil 1 and Ericsson Racing Team, should stand by to offer immediate assistance.

“We are sinking. Everybody up,” commanded Bekking as the water poured into the boat around the keel box. “Slow the boat down, the water is coming in very fast, and close the water tight hatches,” Bekking shouted in the darkness.

Within minutes, the crew was knee deep in water and the safety gear and grab bags were moved on deck. The sail area was reduced to only the staysail and the yacht slowed down as the crew frantically pumped.

“A sailor’s nightmare is sinking,” wrote Bekking at 0945 GMT. “This looked like a pretty serious situation. If we had rats onboard, they would have jumped off by now.”

Down below, water was swirling around the living area of the boat. It was a scene that Hitchcock could only dream of. Water and electricity do not agree with each other and the circuit breakers were popping off all the time. Chris Nicholson dove underwater to connect the two emergency high capacity bilge pumps directly to the batteries which was the only way of assuring power and running the pumps.

Then came the shout, “Pumps are running.” Now the crew would have a chance to beat the incoming flow rate and get the water level down. Slowly, but surely, the crew got the situation under control. Bekking was proud of his boys. “They did well, not just in this emergency situation, but also the way that they have sailed movistar so magnificently up to that moment.”

The crew made an emergency repair to the leaking keel box and sailed slowly towards Cape Horn, passing the scoring gate at 0500 today. They suspended racing at 1338 GMT today and now they are motoring up the Beagle Channel towards Ushuaia, the capital of Argentina’s province of Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost city in the world. Their shore crew will be waiting for them to help repair the boat before returning to the race track and sailing to the finish in Rio de Janeiro.

On the other side of Cape Horn, a deadly combination of massive seas and patches of no wind lay in wait for the rest of the fleet. ABN AMRO ONE was the first to score points, followed by Pirates of the Caribbean, Brasil 1, ABN AMRO TWO and Ericsson Racing Team. The luck was with the back markers as they screamed up behind the leaders in a pattern that is now becoming a familiar threat to Mike Sanderson at the head of the fleet. In a bid to make up lost ground, ABN AMRO TWO destroyed their code six spinnaker when the boat accelerated down an impressively large wave and the bow dug in, stopping the boat dead in her tracks.

Ericsson Racing Team closed to within seven miles of Dutch yacht. A glimmer of hope in catching them led to a large spinnaker being hoisted at daybreak. “We took off down the first wave with such pace that you would swear blind that we were being propelled by something infinitely more powerful than the wind,” wrote Steve Hayles.

Fighting on the edge of control, the motion of the boat was so bad that the battery bank broke loose and the terminals began to short on some carbon structure inside the boat, staring a resin fire. The crew had to strip down the battery bank and lash each cell in place before wiring it all back up.

After 4,500 nautical miles, and 13 days at sea, only 67 miles separated the fleet from first to fifth position leaving it all to play for in the race up the coast of South America.

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