Telefonica Blue reaches Land's End on leg 8 from Galway to Marstrand. Image copyright Rick Tomlinson/Volvo Ocean Race.
by Gabriele Olivo
What a day... It went all wrong hour after hour, "probably someone didn't go to church last Sunday".
This morning we were just in front of Ericsson 4, Delta Lloyd and Puma, catching up with Ericsson 3 and quite happy about the battle that we had during the night to keep our position. Then we decided to go a little lower than the others and slowly but continuously, we got sucked into a mixture of a header and a less favorable tide that we never got out from.
Things went from bad to worse when we had to stop the boat 3 times to clear some weed from the keel. Within 4 hours we lost sight of all the others. Then we started 3-4 tacks completely out of phase and we lost more and more. We're feeling like we've been punched right in the face by Mike Tyson.
As you can imagine, the darkness came onboard. It's the first time that we're last without any damage or excuses to blame on and, believe me, it's not a nice feeling. You can see on everyone's face how bad the mood is. But it's exactly when things goes so bad that you have to get up on your feet and start running again. This is the difference between the lion and the springbok, between the winner and the looser.
P.S. I hope things will change very quickly, otherwise I'll have to eat my words!!
Volvo Ocean Race
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