Today's Sailing News 

Match Race Report

The Grade 2 Fremantle International Match Race regatta features skippers from 3 America's Cup teams.  Chris Dickson from the Oracle Team, Gavin Brady of the Prada Challenge, and Murray Jones representing the Swiss Challenge are 3/8ths of the skippers sailing.

They are sailing a Grade 2 regatta to increase their rankings and to try and gain invitations to Swedish Match Tour events.

Sailing in J 24's the first day saw Murray Jones (ranked 117th) lead with 6 wins and 1 loss.  His loss was to Chris Dickson (ranked 48th) who was 4th with Gavin Brady 5th.

Also with a record of 6 and 1 was Sebastien Destremau whose loss to Jones gave Jones the tiebreak advantage.

The sailors are now seeded.  They will sail 1 vs. 8 etc.  An interesting match will be between 4th seeded Dickson and 5th seeded Brady.

Times Clipper: Race start today

Today, the 8 boat fleet will start their next portion of the crewed around the world race off Panama.  The destination is the Galapagos Islands, 855 miles distant.

Expected arrival is 23 December.  The crews will spend Christmas in the Islands Darwin made famous.

After a 6 day layover the Clippers will sail on 4105 miles to Hawaii.

Sailing Daily will track their progress beginning Monday.

Cannon Big Boat Challenge

On a day off for the Telstra Cup, a fleet of maxi sailed Sydney Harbor.  

15 boats raced with the RP 80 Shockwave finishing 1st.
Next were maxis Wild Thing (4 minutes back) and Brindabella another minute out.  Xena an Open 60 was 7 minutes back from 1st. The Volvo 60 Tyco, by 13 minutes off the pace.  All are line honors possibilities in thy Sydney Hobart race.

Corrected time winner was Aftershock a 58 footer.

Head to the Sailing Daily Forum and discuss sailing!

Today's Vendee Globe Report:   New ranks form

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 Today's Sailing News 

The Race: To Barcelona

With the weather having subdued 5 of the 6 entrants were at sea.  

The smallest catamaran in The race is Warta Polpharma at 85 feet.  9 crew are onboard for the voyage to Barcelona.  Among their tasks according to skipper Roman Paszke,"We have to do mast tuning during our voyage to Barcelona, check the sails and the electronics … We need to calculate how much energy we will consume."

Team Legato left its home port of Bristol at 0600 yesterday morning.

Steve Fossett's Playstation left Falmouth, England at 0900 yesterday.  Playstation was sailing in gale force winds and according to Fossett: "Sea state is rough and we're down to the 3rd reef in the main and have taken down the storm jib."

Team Adventure left La Coruña Spain.  When they arrive in Barcelona their 2500 mile qualification voyage will be complete.  Innovation Explorer must sail 300 more miles to be qualified, while Team Legatao needs 2500 miles to make The Race.

Team Philips: Crew home

Pete Goss and the crew of Team Philips are back in England.

Speaking to the press Pete Goss has not lost faith in Team Philips.  Goss said, "Team Philips is the only reason that we made it through the storm”  Further he said, "The boat was brilliant and the wave-piercing concept really works. I'd go that way again."

Whether Goss gets to work further on perfecting Team Philips is not certain.  He must first salvage her from the Atlantic.  He and his crew will spend the weekend with family.

BT Challenge Update

Leg 3 is  Buenos Aries to  Wellington New Zealand via Cape Horn.  

Leader: Norwich Union by 15 miles

Best 24 Hour Run: LG Flatron 205 Miles

Position:  Heading South off the coast of Argentina

Current Weather: Moderate westerlies

Weather Forecast: Possibility of Northerly gale