Johnny Vincent's Volvo 70 Pace leads the 2026 RORC Round Britain and Ireland Race on the water after 24 hours, but faces a critical tactical decision at Land's End that could reshape the leaderboard.
Pace is taking a more inshore line towards the south-west tip of England at around eight knots, while Jens Kellinghusen's Ker 56 Varuna 6 and Antoine Magre's Mach 50 Palanad 4 have gone offshore and appear to have made gains. The three leaders must now choose how to navigate the Traffic Separation Scheme exclusion zones around the Isles of Scilly before leaving Bishop Rock to starboard. At the time of reporting, Pace remained roughly 20 miles from the decision point.
Joss Cresswell, racing aboard Palanad 4, described a difficult start that improved dramatically after dark. "The first six hours of VMG upwind and short tacking in short choppy sea state was not ideal for the 'big spoon' we call home," he reported. "As darkness fell the wind veered and we were able to ease sheets and put up a Code Zero. Suddenly we were doing 13 knots in 14 knots of windspeed." Cresswell noted that all three leading boats were "grappling with how to best transit the incoming wind hole before getting to more consistent breeze in the Celtic Sea."
Behind the leaders, the Class40 fleet remains tightly grouped. Penfret, Swift and Gambit are expected to round The Lizard in the coming hours, with Graeme Lewis's Maxi Venomous and the Volvo 60 Challenge Ocean also in contention.
In IRC One, Sam and Andrew Hall's Lombard 46 Pata Negra holds a substantial estimated corrected time lead around 90 miles from Bishop Rock. Stickleback lies second with Espresso Martini Too close behind.
IRC Two sees Rob Craigie's Sun Fast 3600 Bellino leading on estimated corrected time, though RORC Commodore Deb Fish cautioned that "there is a very long way to go." Fish reported increasingly light conditions and noted she was resorting to "hand signals, writing notes on the computer at watch changes, and whispering at the top of my voice" after losing her voice to a cold.
The IRC Two-Handed division has tightened considerably. Benjamin Grosman and Klaus Rasmussen's JPK 1080 Ronin leads both on the water and on corrected time, with Sam White and Nathan Steffenoni's JPK 180 Mzungu! second. White, who competed in the 2022 race, warned that early leads can prove meaningless: "I learned from the last race that at this stage you can have a massive lead and it can count for nothing."
Mark Brown's JPK 1010 Jetpack has made a strong opening 24 hours to lead IRC Three, covering approximately 135 miles. Fujitsu British Soldier has recovered ground after a temporary tiller repair, with skipper Will Naylor reporting the crew reached Portland Bill in the early hours and that he had "found the tea bags as well" after extensive shouting.
With more than 1,600 nautical miles remaining, the race to the Celtic Sea is just beginning.
