Light winds to the south of Sicily have turned The Ocean Race Europe 2025 on its head, gifting Swiss entry Team Holcim - PRB a stunning recovery from fifth place to contention at the very front of the fleet within the space of a single day.
For much of the leg, the top four teams had been powering along Sicily's southern coastline aboard their state-of-the-art foiling IMOCA yachts, logging speeds above 20 knots in strong winds and making rapid progress. That all changed around midday on Thursday when the leaders sailed into a patch of near-calm air, their pace dropping to around five knots. While the frontrunners were left stranded in the transition zone between the old breeze and new northerly winds on the island's eastern side, Team Holcim - PRB was still charging through the stronger winds behind them, slicing hour by hour into a deficit that had once stood at well over 100 miles.
Life at the front had already been demanding. Racing in fast reaching conditions on a carbon-hulled IMOCA in a lumpy sea is as physically punishing as it is quick, as Francesca Clapcich, sailing aboard Boris Herrmann's Team Malizia (GER), made clear.
"In these conditions life on board is hard," she explained. "We can't really move around so much, even basic things like peeing on the bucket is super hard. You always need to be careful in these conditions, always one hand for the boat and the other for whatever it is you are doing. They are definitely not the most comfortable boats in the world. They are quick, but not comfortable."
Skipper Rosalin Kuiper (SUI) was already sensing the opportunity opening up for Team Holcim - PRB on Thursday morning, with the gap to the leaders closing fast.
"We have made very good gains on our competitors," she said. "We are within 45 miles now, so we made up 100 miles in the past 24 hours. That's successful, I would say. It's very pretty, we have a beautiful view of the cliffs [of Sicily] and it's amazing to be here. Really nice to wake up like this: very different to last night when again we had a big light show with a lot of thunder and lightning around, and now everything is like a fairy tail again. Champagne sailing."
By 1700 on Thursday, the Swiss boat had completed its charge and slotted into the line-abreast formation at the front of the fleet. Overall race leader Paul Meilhat, skipper of Biotherm (FRA), acknowledged the game had changed.
"We were having a race with four boats and now it is a race with five boats because Holcim joined the game," he said.
Meilhat also offered a frank assessment of conditions near the island. "We are under Sicily and the wind is coming from the north. Sicily has lots of very high mountains, one more than 3,000 metres, so now we are just glued in no wind. But tonight we are going to catch the wind from the other side, from the northeast, and there will probably be strong winds again, like 20 or 25 knots, for a few hours. But then tomorrow morning it is back to light wind."
As darkness settled in, the pack shifted to upwind mode, tacking their way north towards the south-east tip of the island in search of the approaching northerly. The new breeze finally filled in around three in the morning. At that point, Team Holcim - PRB took a gamble, electing to press east directly towards the next waypoint rather than follow the other four boats, which had tacked north in pursuit of better pressure.
"We are the most southern boat in the fleet at the moment," Kuiper reported. "The other boats all tacked further north. We ran out of breeze just now and did a sail change, but let's see how the guys and girls do in the north. We have decided to go straight to the waypoint and I hope it turns out the way we want it to."
Shortly after sunrise, the tracker suggested the gamble had paid off, with the Swiss crew showing a slender one-nautical-mile lead over the group as everyone sailed upwind in around 13 knots of breeze. By 1400 that afternoon, just five miles separated the five leading boats. Ambrogio Beccaria's Allagrande Mapei held a narrow advantage at the front, with Team Holcim - PRB second, Biotherm third, Team Malizia fourth, and the long-time Leg 5 leader Yoann Richomme's Paprec Arkéa (FRA) fifth.
With a little over 500 nautical miles remaining to the finish in Boka Bay, Montenegro, the five crews face the prospect of racing almost side by side all the way to the line. Five days of hard racing have taken their toll, and managing physical reserves will be every bit as important as boat speed over the closing stages. Meilhat captured the mood across the fleet.
"We will try to fight to the finish line," he said. "The important thing is not to separate too much from the fleet and to stay close with the other boats. It's nearly three days to go to Montenegro so we need to keep some energy."
