In the end, Charlie Enright didn't let himself be caught up. In the past few days, the lead had changed spectacularly 16 times between his 11th Hour Racing yacht and Team Malizia's Seaexplorer boat – but finally, after 38 days, 17 hours, 2 minutes and 26 seconds at sea, the 41-year-old skipper from the USA and his crew were the first to reach the port of Newport on the American east coast late on Thursday evening German time and thus won the fourth stage of the Ocean Race.
Sebastian Reuter
Senior editor of the service.
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They crossed the finish line for just 40 minutes ahead of the Malizia crew, led by Britain's Will Harris. "I've been dreaming of this moment for so long," said Enright, who is taking part in the more than 32,000 nautical miles (about 60,000 kilometers) round-the-world regatta for the third time, after the home victory and let himself and his crew celebrate in bright sunshine with the obligatory champagne shower.
"I'm so proud of the whole team"
With the French team Biotherm, the third and last crew will finish the fourth Ocean Race stage this Thursday, which started at the end of April in Itajai, Brazil, and led north across the Atlantic through several complicated weather passages with heavy storms and high waves, but also longer periods of calm.
Difficult conditions, which in the course of the stage led to the highly favored Swiss Holcim team led by skipper Kevin Escoffier and the german-French Guyot crew with Berlin's Robert Stanjek on board, two out of five yachts had to stop the stage prematurely due to broken masts.
Serious setbacks that the Malizia crew, which had already been battered with problems on previous stages, were spared this time. "It's a wonderful feeling. We had almost no technical failures on this stage and proved that we can sail quite fast even in conditions with weak winds. I'm so proud of the whole team. Now we're among the front runners in the battle for overall victory," said Harris after crossing the finish line.
After their retirement, the Holcim crew is now only one point ahead of Team Malizia and 19th Hour Racing with 11 points each in the overall standings with 18 points to go with three stages to sail. For the fight for the regatta victory, the fifth stage is now of particular importance. It starts on May 21 in Newport, leads 3500 nautical miles across the Atlantic back to Europe to the port of the Danish city of Aarhus and is counted twice.
Then the Malizia crew will again be led by skipper Boris Herrmann. After a break of several weeks and already planned in advance with his family, the Hamburg native feels "full of energy and fresh" again for his "re-start into the race" and the upcoming finale of the regatta, which will pass Kiel around June 9 and end in Genoa in Italy via the stage destination The Hague at the beginning of July.
However, it is questionable to what extent the Guyot team around Stanjek will even take part in the Ocean Race again. After the mast broke a few days ago, the time until the start in Newport in ten days is likely to be too short to make the crew, which was completely dejected after the second stage exit, and the boat, which is only partially competitive anyway, fit again for another strenuous transatlantic stage.
In addition, the organization and transport of a replacement mast is allegedly associated with costs of more than half a million euros. Accordingly, the words of co-skipper Benjamin Dutreux sound unconfident: "We are a small team and cannot always do what we want. First of all, we have to come ashore. Then we can find solutions."