Leg five was a beautiful day in Sailing Arabia The Tour! We started out of Ras Al Khaimah at 11:00 am for this challenging leg, which takes the fleet 50 miles up and around the Omani Peninsula, and 50 or so miles down the other side to Dibba in Oman. This area is known for its rugged mountain ranges that rise up to 2,100 meters. We had a great downwind spinnaker flight to the top of the Strait of Hormuz, where we rounded magnificent cliffs, through crazy tides and currents. It was wonderful to see, and at one stage over 30 boats, headed for Iranian waters, ran through the fleet. It was pretty exciting! I looked carefully for any long barreled guns, but didn’t see any, so was not worried. Plus we had the Omani Naval patrol nearby, so nothing could go to wrong…
After getting through to the other side, we headed down the coast with light wind. It was one of those euros-to-zeros back to heroes kind of race. The forecast had called for big winds and reaching, but the cliffs protected us. It was a long night of very nuanced sailing with weight movement. We sent the Omani women below often to get rest, because weight was also good to have inside the boat while mostly wind/reaching in light fare. At one stage I saw clouds developing onshore, and knowing that the edges of clouds were windows, we headed closer to shore. We jagged our own little shore breeze, that the other boats who were farther out off-shore did not have. Quickly we passed the fleet and were in first!
R – Raham interview, M – Huda trimming and L – Eptisom at helm.
However, EFG’s skipper, Sidney Gavignet, is a professional and never gives up. He quickly headed to shore and caught up with us, and ended up passing us not far from the finish line. The wind was crazy at the finish, which was deep in a bay of fishing pots, with 180° shifts. EFG and Mezze Frankfurt passed by staying offshore, further away from some cliffs that were not helpful. We ended up in third place at the finish line, which puts us in third overall at this stage of the Tour. Our team learned a lot, and were very excited to finish in front of most of the fleet again.
Today we are giving back to our sponsors, and will have guests onboard. There are no points for today. It will be interesting, because we are going to have the Omani women practice all the racing positions. It is a great opportunity to give them good coaching, while racing without cost of points. They continue to learn that this is a team sport, and everyone has to work together in unison. One of the big lessons this past week has been learning about different responses in different conditions – like moving lightly and gently while hoisting a spinnaker, compared to hoisting a spinnaker in bug winds where aggressive, fast, hard body movements are used.
Two more legs left, and we sit in third. My expectations for the team have already been exceeded, and I am very happy with what the team has achieved. We will continue to try to obtain a first or second podium finish, but it’s all a bonus at this stage. I will be interested to see where the Omani women go from here. Two of them originally instructed children in the Oman Sail Program. The other is on loan from the Royal Navy, and I will be curious if she will continue sailing or will return to her duties there. Time will tell.
