The six boat Volvo Ocean Race fleet remained locked in a sweltering hot struggle for supremacy overnight as they continued their relentless progress towards the first turning point of the second stage of Leg 3 off the northern tip of Sumatra.

At 0400 UTC Ken Read’s PUMA Ocean Racing powered by BERG had maintained their lead at the head of the fleet, 1.7 nautical miles (nm) ahead of Chris Nicholson’s second placed CAMPER with Emirates Team New Zealand who had been steadily giving up their previous northerly positioning on the leading boat.

For the next 1,000 nautical miles, the Volvo Open 70 fleet will predominantly be on port tack in a drag race that is taking the fleet across the southern tip of Sri Lanka and into the Bay of Bengal towards the waypoint at Pulau We and the entrance of the Malacca Strait, nine miles off the northernmost tip of Sumatra.

They may have been deprived of a visit to Neptune’s court during Leg 1 but there was no escaping the King of the Seas for the four Team Sanya crew members as they raced to the safe haven.

Four of the seven crew on board Sanya were hauled before King Neptune as part of the traditional ceremony to mark the crossing of the Equator.

A small snapshot exit poll conducted at Cape Town International Airport by the Western Cape government has yielded overwhelmingly positive results, says Western Cape Tourism MEC, Alan Winde.  
 
The poll was conducted on January 11 to measure foreign visitors’ perceptions and experiences of the Western Cape. Although only 25 people from 14 countries were interviewed, the Western Cape scored an overall holiday experience rating of 8,5 out of 10.

In the Volvo Ocean Race even the tiniest of advantages can spell success on the race course – and having a chance to work on their boats in port gave Abu Dhabi and PUMA the edge they needed for glory the in Leg 3 Stage 1 sprint, according to their skippers.