With three teams tied for the lead to start the final leg of the Volvo Ocean Race, Leg 11 was always going to be intense.
© Ugo Fonolla/Volvo Ocean Race
But overnight, the intensity ratcheted up to unseen levels.
The leaders, Dongfeng Race Team and MAPFRE, swapped the lead back and forth. The third team in the mix for the overall title, Team Brunel, recovered from a poor opening to the leg and saw their defict drop from 20 miles to as close as four miles.
As at 0700 UTC on Saturday morning, Charles Caudrelier's Dongfeng Race Team was half a mile ahead of Xabi Fernández's crew on MAPFRE. Bouwe Bekking's Brunel team was 8 miles back.
The leading group was just under 20 miles from the Norway turning mark.
© Jeremie Lecaudey/Volvo Ocean Race
Maintaining a grip on a podium position was Charlie Enright and Vestas 11th Hour Racing, fresh off the Aarhus mark rounding in front of 'home' crowd of Vestas supporters in Denmark.
But at the front of the fleet, with the race on the line, the tension is palpable.
"We're in a building breeze right now, about 17 miles off the waypoint where we will bear away and head to Denmark," said Dongfeng Race Team's Carolijn Brouwer on Saturday morning.
"We have MAPFRE just to leeward of us. We've had a battle with them in the transitions, flapping around in no wind and that also gave an opportunity for the back of the fleet to catch up a little bit. Vestas is quite close and the others are further, about10 miles back I'm guessing."
"It's been a busy night for us on MAPFRE," said Antonio Cuervos-Mons. "We are pretty tight with Dongfeng and we have to keep pushing. Last evening we had upwind and reaching conditions and now we have a bit of a compression with everyone coming together. But it seems like Dongfeng and us we have escaped a little bit, we got the breeze before them..."
For Brunel, it's been a positive 12 hours of racing, recovering at least 10 miles to the leading pair. But there is still a lot of work to do if Bekking is to be in the mix on the sprint down the west coast of Denmark to The Hague.
"We've got to hope we find a passing lane somewhere between now and the finish," said boat captain Abby Ehler. "I'm trying to remain optimistic, but it's hard. It's going to be tough. But we will keep pushing - never give up."
The rest of the fleet is in the mix. Vestas 11th Hour Racing is holding firmly to its third place podium position while team AkzoNobel has been back and forth with Brunel.
© Rich Edwards/Volvo Ocean Race
At the back of the fleet Scallywag is holding tight to Turn the Tide on the Plastic. This is the race for sixth place and it too appears like it will go down to the wire.
