SBHOnline Trans-Atlantic Race Contest

[KevinS]

SBHOnline has traditionally had a contest to guess the winner of what has always (here) been called La Transat. The former primary sponsor of the race has dropped out, and the name of the race has been changed.



For now, until perhaps a new primary sponsors jumps in, we're talking about the Transat en Double Concarneau - Saint-Barthélemy, the 2-handed Trans-Atlantic race from Concarneau in Brittany to St Barth. (Transat en Double – TED 21, this year)


There are 18 Benetau Figaro-3 boats in the race, new one-design boats which have never before been used in a Trans-Atlantic race. The crew of the 18 boats consist of 33 men and 3 women.


Here are some links for those who chose to follow the race, or to who chose to participate in the contest. The information is (almost?) exclusively in French. If you are not a French-speaker then Google Translate is your friend. For those looking at a page on FB, FB's translation is inferior to Google's. I can't speak to Apple's new Translate feature. I have never used it.


Here's the link to the main race website.
https://www.transatendouble.bzh/


You can also find some inforation on Le Journal's webpage.
https://www.journaldesaintbarth.com/actualites/transat.html


FB
https://www.facebook.com/latransatendouble/

Twitter
https://twitter.com/TransatEnDouble

Instagram
https://instagram.com/latransatendouble/




Here are the rules which we have used in the past. I had considered making a change to the duration of the window when entries can be made, but at the speed that these boats are moving today, that would leave a window of less than 24 hours for entries to be made.


Contest Rules
The contest is to pick the winning TED21 (Transat en Double - Concarneau-Saint-Barthélemy 2021) boat and closest time of arrival as recorded at the official arrival in St. Barth. Each member can pick only one boat and one arrival time in even hours. Once a member picks that boat and time, no member can pick that boat within one hour of the original entry. For example, Tim picks -

GEDIMAT 14:00 APRIL 27, 2014 Tim

JEK could later pick the same boat but only so long as the arrival time was one hour different, e.g. -

GEDIMAT 15:00 APRIL 27, 2014 JEK

Dennis could then pick-

GEDIMAT 13:00 APRIL 27, Dennis

If GEDIMAT comes in ahead of the fleet at 13:31 on April 27, Tim wins the grand prize - except that Tim, as a moderator, is disqualified.

The opportunity to pick your winners WILL BE ANNOUNCED when the first vessel is within approximately 1,000 miles of St. Barth. That opportunity will close once the first vessel is within 500 miles of St. Barth. The average speed as of the last update is 12 knots, but that could change at any time. If the 12 knot speed is maintained then that will provide about a 42-hour window for entries.

 

[JEK]

Dennis never wins anything. Well, other than Lisa:heart1:

 

[amyb]

And what a prize HE got with that pick!

 

[Dennis]

Dennis never wins anything. Well, other than Lisa:heart1:

many a man would call that a jackpot

 

[JEK]

many a man would call that a jackpot

:up:

 

[GramChop]

Menace DEFINITELY married, as my Grams would say, “above his station”! :heart1:

 

[GramChop]

Didn’t Amy win this one (recent) year?

 

[amyb]

Yup...and I wore out the purple team tee shirt with the Monopoly man on it. I think it was team FOLLOW THE RICH, but I am not sure any more

 

[elgreaux]

Yup...and I wore out the purple team tee shirt with the Monopoly man on it. I think it was team FOLLOW THE RICH, but I am not sure any more

actually it was SAVE THE RICH...

 

[amyb]

Thanks, Ellen. You nailed it once again.

 

[GramChop]

I recall you wearing that T-shirt at a Villa Party at EMM, Amy.

 

[amyb]

I recall you wearing that T-shirt at a Villa Party at EMM, Amy.

The team color coded was a plaid on purple...it worked for me.

 

[JEK]

I remember the guy who was running low on food and craving Spam. Sent him a few tins.

 

[amyb]

Well played!

 

[KevinS]

Here are the boat positions as of 03:10 Paris time, (21:10ET). Sometime overnight the fleet will pass by the Mark at La Palma. I think that the Mark is the blue dot just north of La Palma. The boats most keep the Mark to starboard (the right) as they pass, and will have a choice of sailing between the Mark and La Palma, or sailing between La Palma and Tenerif. Once they pass the Mark, the boats have complete freedom to pick whatever route they want.

The local team has dropped back to 12th, but it is still early days.

 

[KevinS]

As of 12:10 Paris time (07:10ET), the majority of the fleet has passed between La Palma, and the Mark just north of it.

Here is a portion of the Météo Consult for the next few days:

General situation: On Wednesday, the high pressure center at 1028 hPa off Portugal spreads more and more in a high pressure axis between 25N / 40W and the southern Bay of Biscay. The low pressure system present for several days over West Africa at 10113 hPa persists. This configuration maintains a strong unstable north-northeast sector flow between the south of Portugal and the north of the Canaries, a flow that nevertheless weakens in the south of the archipelago.

On Thursday, under the pressure of a stormy low centered in western Ireland, the high pressure began to show signs of weakness. However, this development has little consequence for the moment on the flow near the Canaries. In the south of the archipelago, the unstable and moderate north-easterly trade wind is maintained thanks to the persistence of the low pressure system nearby over West Africa which generates a fairly tight pressure gradient while in the north the flow remains very strong and locally close to the gale with gusts.

On Friday, the development of the depression and its disturbance revitalized the flow between the Azores and Portugal and allowed the trade winds to pick up some strength in the southwest of the Canaries.

On Saturday, the strengthening of the trade winds continued thanks to the arrival of a mass of cold air at altitude brought by the disturbance off Portugal and associated with the Irish depression now positioned in the North Sea.

Weather conditions at sea:
The 14 leading boats are still grouped together and position themselves early in the morning north of the crossing mark of La Palma, the most westerly island of the Canary Islands archipelago. It seems that all agreed to get closer to the direct route before approaching the passage between the islands this morning. This option caused a delay in the time of passage in the archipelago initially planned. Like the previous one, the night was not easy in a still strong and very unstable wind for the most part forcing them to be extra vigilant. This collective choice nevertheless made it possible to limit the gybes while maintaining good speed of progression. Even though these have fallen over the past 24 hours, the fleet continues to progress between 8 and 12 knots depending on the position of the boats in latitude. These speeds are now comparable with the bottom of the standings, whereas yesterday the differential was 5 knots in favor of the leaders. However, the gap continues to grow between the 1st and the last. It is now almost a day and a half with the 18th competitor, positioned 350 miles north of the archipelago.

Wednesday May 19
The rounding of La Palma could prove tricky at times for the 14 leading boats. Indeed, if the general and unstable flow of the north-northeast sector stabilizes between force 4 and 5 Beaufort on the approach to the island, or even sometimes a little less, sudden accelerations will be observed during its bypass. . The north to north-easterly wind will thus quickly increase to force 7 and even locally up to gale force 8 with gusts. This type of situation is all the more delicate because it also favors the formation of small depressions to the south of the islands, with the consequence of possible weak winds down to force 3 Beaufort and even spectacular refusals with the direction of the wind. At the South-East. Once the archipelago is crossed, the fleet will find better conditions. The north-northeast wind will certainly remain unstable, but its drop to force 4 on average will allow the competitors to recover from their fatigue while concentrating on their new strategy towards the West Indies. This will not be the case for latecomers north of the Canaries. The strong wind, between 23 and 30 knots on average, will continue to accompany them until they approach the archipelago.

Thursday, May 20
Now positioned in the southwest of the Canaries, the 14 leading boats will progress south of the direct route. They don't have much choice, because in the north the wind is less present. They will sail on starboard tack in a not very trade wind, oriented to the north-northeast sector force 3 to 5 Beaufort and still unstable with sudden gusts. The fleet is now entering a navigation where it will be necessary to watch for the variation of the wind according to the diurnal evolution and to watch the cumuliform clouds announcing reinforcements. New strategies will be observed, between the supporters of roads more or less distant from the orthodromy. For the 4 boats bringing up the rear, the crossing of the Canary Islands archipelago should take place in less sustained conditions than for the first, but still conducive to traps related to slack and sudden acceleration in a short time.

 

[didier]

I think I won the last wimco prize for the race across the atlantic. may 2018. Andynap and I were the closest to the time the winner came in.

 

[KevinS]

For those on FB, some video of the passage by La Palma. The humming noise in some of the video is noise coming off of the keel. One boat is dealing with a torn spinnaker:

https://www.facebook.com/latransatendouble/videos/806316100317792

 

[KevinS]

From the TED21 FB page. The "local" boat has dropped back to 12th. They're dealing with a broken Automatic Pilot, in weather conditions that prevent them from attempting to repair it:

 

[amyb]

A shame.Hope weather conditions improve soon.