The closest finish yet
On May 27 Team SCA crossed the finish line into Lisbon recording their closest finish to date. Leg 7 saw them finish 4hours 22min 49seconds behind first placed Team Brunel – in one of the closest fleet finishes in this edition of the race. It was an unusual transatlantic. “It was like someone had ironed the Atlantic, so we had flat water and really light winds, this was my 21st Transat and I have never seen the Atlantic like it,” commented skipper Sam Davies. Leg 7 also marks the end of the ‘ocean legs’ and the completion of a true lap of the planet for Team SCA.
The 2,800-mile leg was more like an offshore match race at times, as the fleet often found themselves in physical sight of each other or through AIS. “For me it was a game of snakes and ladders, we would go two steps forward and then be one step back again, but now it’s about how do we get the 0.1 knot of boat speed out of the boat, and we are right into the detail now of how to compete, which is a world away from where we were seven legs ago,” commented Abby Ehler.