SAILING ROUND WORLD RACE: WITH THE pre-dawn calls to worship from temples, mosques and churches echoing across the still waters of Kochi, Torben Grael steered Ericsson 4 gently alongside the dock at Willingdon Island to collect his second leg-winner's trophy in the second leg of the Volvo Ocean Race.
Surrounded by a garland of forest cuttings that drift constantly down-tide, the Killian Bushe-constructed overall leader appeared remarkably unscathed after a mostly fast-paced, 4,500-mile leg from Cape Town to India that lasted just over two weeks. It meant they arrived four days ahead of schedule.
That early arrival almost caught organisers unawares, but gangs of labourers worked all weekend to complete the race village and roadways leading up to it ahead of its official opening tonight.
But that did not deter a crowd of a thousand local visitors from welcoming second-placed Telefonica Blue and her well-pleased skipper, Bouwe Bekking.
Having smashed her port-side dagger-board in the demanding Southern Ocean passage through the scoring-gate in the first week of the leg, Bekking's luck appeared to have deserted him. Vital for maintaining steerage, losing the foil might easily have resulted in last place.
On the contrary, the skipper of the Spanish boat manoeuvred west around most of Grael's pursuers while passing through the Doldrums last week and leveraged an advantage that delivered both second place for the leg and bounced the Dutchman and his crew back into contention in second overall.
While the final podium place for this leg appears certain to go to Grael's stable-mates on Ericsson 3, Anders Lewander's team is still working off its low-scoring from early in the race, which leaves third overall up for grabs when the next batch of boats reach India today.
That battle falls to two injured boats - American Ken Read on Puma Racing and Ireland's Green Dragon. While Ian Walker might take inspiration from Bekking's good fortune in being able to persist competitively with a damaged dagger-board, the lack of a boom for the final leg is far more tricky given that upwind conditions won't suit this incomplete configuration.
Team Delta Lloyd, the previous race winner owned by Limerick's Ger O'Rourke, is close behind and well-positioned to pick off the injured Dragon.
Read, on the hand, seems better able to withstand the two bouts of structural damage inflicted in the Southern Ocean.
The light winds prevailing on the final stretch past the spectacular beaches of the state of Kerala are unlikely to unduly stress the hull; the conditions in the Yellow Sea just six weeks away may not be so kind.
