Built for the job
To take on such a tough race, you need a boat capable of enduring
exceptional weather. Elaine Bunting finds out what makes the Challenge
yachts so robust.
For the 12-strong race fleet of Challenge 72-footers, this is the
second race round the world, and between times they’ve raced
across the Atlantic and round Britain. They have already proven themselves
many times over.
The steel yachts were specifically designed to be strong, safe and
seaworthy in even the worst conditions. They should be self-sufficient
for long periods at sea, with enough fuel and water to take their
crews safely to a distant port. They should also be relatively easy
to sail, not highly-strung race boats but even-tempered all-rounders
that can be handled by crews who are not professional.
An enormous amount of water comes over the deck as they crash upwind
in heavy weather conditions, where the yachts and huge waves meet
at opposing speeds. Reefing winches are sited at a centre cockpit
rather than on the mast so that crew can grind facing forwards, with
much less risk of being washed off their feet than there would be
if they were standing side-on at a mast winch.
Below, the saloon and galley are the heart of the boat, the place
where crew eat and get together. Both are amidships, where the pitching
of the boat is least. Underneath the floor are the boat’s fuel
and water tanks, almost 4,000 litres in total.
Water is one of the biggest priorities on any boat at sea, but the
crews should not run short. They have tankage of 980 litres plus two
reserve tanks (which must be kept filled) totalling 720 litres and
each yacht has a watermaker to keep the supply topped up.
Fuel tankage is also generous. As with water, yachts have to keep
a portion of fuel untouched in reserve tanks, so that if a crew were
to lose their mast at the furthest point from land in the race and
had no fuel in the non reserve tanks, they could motor for about 10
days at economical revs. This would give them a conservative range
of 1,200 to 1,500 miles, enough to motor north out of the worst of
the Southern Ocean.
Heaters on each of the boats will keep living conditions bearable
in the icy waters of the Southern Ocean – and will help dry
out a perpetual stream of wet clothing. A diesel generator produces
the 24V electrical supply for navigation equipment, lights, water
pumps, computers and communications equipment so that each boat can
remain fully independent at sea. |
 Specifications
Length overall: 72ft 22 m
Length of waterline: 61ft 19 m
Beam: 18ft 2in 5.5m
Air draught: 95ft 29 m
Draught full load: 10ft 3.05 m
Displacement: half load 40 tonnes
Ballast: 12.5 tonnes
Sail area: windward: 2,825ft2 262.5m2
Sail area: downwind: 4,020ft2 373 m2
Water capacity: 390gal 1,775lt
Fuel capacity: 475gal 2,150lt
Hull: 50A mild steel
Deck: Stainless steel
Designer: Rob Humphreys
|
|
 Life
on board
What will it be like for the 17 crew aboard each Challenge yacht?
A great test of character, says David Glenn
Learning to live inside a 72ft metal hull with 17 relative strangers
for up to 40 days at a time is one of the greatest tests of the individuals
taking part in the Global Challenge. Coping with minimal privacy and
scrambled body clocks will require unusual amounts of discipline and
broadmindedness. Character will be put to the test.
Apart from learning how to sail and race the yachts, each crewmember
is designated a specialist task for which they are given professional
training. So each yacht has an engineer, a plumber, a carpenter, a
rigger and at least two people managing all the safety equipment.
Someone will study global weather patterns, another will be checking
local pilotage for ports of call.
Each skipper plans his own watch system in which teams, each with
a watch leader, will rotate between sailing the boat, sleeping and
eating. Typically, there might be three watches of six people, in
which each watch spends three hours sailing the yacht, navigating,
running the communications, cooking and cleaning, and six hours off
– probably asleep. That might vary in rough conditions or if
the spinnaker is set.
Normally, it is the responsibility of each ‘on’ watch
to prepare food, cook and wash up. Acclimatising is difficult in the
early stages of each leg. There will be constant, sometimes violent
motion below decks where the conditions will sometimes be cold and
wet (despite a heating system) or, at best, hot and humid with the
air never at its freshest.
Onboard cuisine will not be quite in the astronaut league, but not
far off. Provisioning is a difficult task to get right, especially
on the longer legs when almost 2,500 servings will be prepared. Too
much food and the tightly controlled budget is blown and unnecessary
weight carried. Too little and the well-being and efficiency of the
crew are put at risk, though they shouldn’t run out entirely:
each of the boats are required to carry a week’s worth of extra
provisions, over and above their calculation for a leg.
Space, weight considerations, the absence of freezers and fridges
and the length of each leg means freeze-dried foods, which require
only water and heating, are de rigueur throughout the fleet. The yachts
are equipped with six-burner stoves, a grill and an oven, all using
gas.
Watermakers fitted to the yachts produce around 1.6 litres of fresh
water per hour and squashes, coffee, tea, chocolate and other drinks
are carried in abundance. The yachts are also self-sufficient in terms
of power, with a generator or engine used to produce power for lights,
heaters, watermakers and the power-hungry computers. During the Southern
Ocean legs last time, generators were run between two and six hours
a day on average, to keep life on board ticking over efficiently.
|
|
 Facing
the facts
What will the crews of the Global Challenge yachts face as they race
round the world? Elaine Bunting finds out
Crews dressed as if for a moonwalk, struggling at the wheel: these
are images synonymous that have become associated with the Global
Challenge. It isn’t all storms and monster waves by any means,
though, and to win this race crews must get the best from their boat
in all conditions. For large sections of the race, they will be sailing
upwind against prevailing winds and currents, but they will encounter
everything from heavy weather to calms, and so they will have to vary
their strategy.
Broadly speaking, there are two main obstacles facing crews in the
race: the North and South Atlantic legs and the Southern Ocean legs.
The ferocious gales and gigantic seas are a major part of the Global
Challenge but in fact a majority of the legs are in the Atlantic,
where conditions are much more variable.
They say that races are won and lost in light winds. It will be no
different in this race; the Atlantic parts are going to be crucial
to the overall results. The crews will encounter light winds at some
point, particularly as they try to thread their way through the faint
airs of the Doldrums, or Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), that
lies between the weather patterns of the Northern and Southern Hemisphere.
The ITCZ is inescapable on legs from Portsmouth to Buenos Aires and
from Cape Town to Boston but it varies in width and its position can
fluctuate daily. The trick is to try to work out where the thinnest
slice of light winds will be when you arrive.
On those Atlantic legs the boats will spend much of their time sailing
free or even downwind under spinnaker. In these winds, getting the
best speed from the boat is vital and imaginative weather interpretation
and meteorological knowledge are all-important.
The Southern Ocean is a complete contrast. Once crews turn right at
Cape Horn, they can expect a succession of deep low-pressure systems,
bringing frequent gales or storms. It will get colder and colder as
they edge southwards. Rain will turn to driving hail, and ice will
form on deck.
Encounters with ice are possible, though waypoints on both of the
Southern Ocean legs will force the fleet to squeeze northwards away
from known ice limits. These marks of the course also impose some
tactical considerations midway through long legs.
The worse of the two Southern Ocean legs tends to be between Sydney
and Cape Town. This is probably the wildest ocean in the world. In
the last two round the world races, the boats confronted winds of
70 knots, with cruelly punishing seas and the monotonous hard labour
of endless sail changes.
During these weeks at sea, weather interpretation and strategy are
still important, but seamanship comes into its own. One of the great
sporting truisms is that to finish first, first you’ve got to
finish. In the Southern Ocean, skippers have to decide on a balance
between pushing to win and protecting the boat, the gear and the crew.
To finish the race, crews need a mixture of skill and stamina, daring
and caution, but to win they will have to perform consistently all
the way. |
| |
|
