BT Global Challenge fleet will arrive in Sydney today

by BT Event Media on 26 Feb 2001 With 115 miles to the finish Logica has increased its lead to 10 miles over BP who has overtaken LG FLATRON pushing them into third place.

These three look very likely to take the podium positions as they extend their lead over the rest of the fleet and continue to show better boat speed. The order of finishing is not so certain however as although FLATRON is trailing Logica by 13 miles and BP by four, it is in the favoured northerly position. This may well pay dividends on the final approach to Sydney, particularly against BP who is the most southerly of the three.

Compaq is 45 miles to the south of FLATRON and trailing the leaders by 28 miles. Although it has been steadily gaining it will need a big change in the wind direction to improve on its position, and may fall prey to TeamSpirIT 18 miles behind but almost 40 miles north. Compaq is very vulnerable to a change in the wind direction to the north and will be fortunate to hold onto fourth place.

The advantage from being north is two fold, firstly the East Australian Current is pushing the yachts south and this gets stronger as the yachts approach the coast. Also if the wind stays in the northeast, as forecast, the more northerly yachts should be able to sail under spinnaker and therefore go faster.

VERITAS and Spirit of Hong Kong are separated by just one mile in distance to go, with VERITAS holding the northerly position, although slightly behind. They are expected to overtake Spirit in the next few hours.

The leaders are expected to cross the finish line late this evening or early tomorrow morning (GMT) with the last yacht some 10 hours later. Whatever the final positions are it looks like there will be some exciting sailing through Sydney harbour where some of the results may well be decided.

Latest rankings, 07:45 GMT - 25/02/01:

1 Logica - 115 miles to finish
2 BP +10 miles to leader
3 LG FLATRON - 13 miles to leader
4 Compaq +28 miles to leader
5 TeamSpirIT +46 miles to leader
6 Spirit of Hong Kong + 52 miles to leader
7 VERITAS +53 miles to leader
8 Isle of Man +64 miles to leader
9 Olympic Group +66 miles to leader
10 Norwich Union +80 miles to leader

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