Yachting: Germans in sight of race title

By JULIE ASH

Illbruck all but secured overall victory in the round-the-world race yesterday by winning the seventh leg.

The German entry finished the 3400-nautical- mile transatlantic journey from Annapolis to La Rochelle in 10 days 20h 44m 30s.

Assa Abloy was second, three hours behind illbruck, and Kevin Shoebridge's Tyco was third, a further hour back.

SEB nudged out Grant Dalton's Amer Sports One to claim fourth. News Corp finished sixth and djuice seventh in the Volvo-sponsored race.

Illbruck, which has now won four legs of the race, reached a top speed of 38.98 knots and is expected to enter the record books for achieving a 24-hour run of 484 nautical miles.

The monohull speed record is subject to confirmation by the International Sailing Federation.

With just two short legs remaining, illbruck has an eight-point advantage over second-placed Assa Abloy, which is on 41 points.

Amer Sports One is third with 36 points, two points ahead of News Corp.

Tyco has 33, SEB 26, djuice 21 and Amer Sports Too 10.

The leaders will clinch the title unless the yacht finishes fifth or worse in the next two legs, and Assa Abloy wins both.

But the illbruck crew are not complacent.

"There's 22 per cent of the points still left on the table and the race is not over until it's over," skipper John Kostecki said.

"We could break something, and all of a sudden it could be a close race."

Aucklander Shoebridge said the seventh leg was one of the best of the race so far.

"It was really enjoyable, really fast sailing. The first four or five days in the Gulf Stream were brilliant.

"I know we did big miles, and they were Gulf Stream-assisted, but [despite that] the sailing was really good."

Fellow New Zealander Dalton lamented lost opportunities.

"We were obviously pretty good out of the Chesapeake and so pleased with ourselves that we lost concentration for a couple of hours and that was it, right there," Dalton said.

"There was basically a shipping separation zone outside the Chesapeake and we had planned to go south of it to try to move ourselves towards the Gulf Stream quicker.

"The fleet went north and a front came in, which we hadn't picked, and hit the boats in the north first and they sprinted. From then on we were playing catch-up."

Amer Sports Too, which retired to Halifax after breaking a mast during the first week, is on its way to La Rochelle on a cargo ship.

The eighth leg, 1075 miles from La Rochelle to Goteborg, starts on May 25. The final leg, 250 miles to Kiel, begins on June 8 and is expected to take just one day.

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