The forks so far
the newest first · a fork is a stretch of the course where the fleet took different roads
Fuerteventura
East or west of Fuerteventura?
From the Lanzarote mark the course runs south-west toward Trindade, and Fuerteventura lies across it: pass east of the island, between it and Africa, or west of it, toward Gran Canaria.
West came out ahead: 5 of 5 matched pairs, by 6 h in the typical pair, and the lower median (21 h against 22 h).
East
4 boats
median 22 h
West
10 boats
median 21 h
Matched pairs
5 of 5
west ahead · east in 0
Model wind found
10.6 · 12.0 kt
east · west; light air 21% · 24% of reports
Time through the fork
a dot a boat, a row a road · the bar is the road’s median
Matched pairs
different roads, the same hours at the entry
West ahead in 5 of 5 matched pairs, east in 0. Fastest east: Pat, 18 h. Fastest west: Damien, 16 h.
- Ertan went east and Etienne west, 1 h apart at the Lanzarote mark: Etienne came out 5 h ahead.
- Ertan went east and Daniel west, 2 h apart at the Lanzarote mark: Daniel came out 6 h ahead.
- Ertan went east and Guido west, 3 h apart at the Lanzarote mark: Guido came out 6 h ahead.
- Henry went east and Louis west, 5 h apart at the Lanzarote mark: Louis came out 14 h ahead.
- Andrea went east and Etienne west, 6 h apart at the Lanzarote mark: Etienne came out 4 h ahead.
Every boat
times UTC, worked out between two reports and given to the hour · model wind between entry and exit
| Skipper | Road | Time | Entered | Out | Model wind, mean | Light air, share of reports | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Damien Solarem | west | 16 h | 16 Sep 12:00 | 17 Sep 04:00 | 16.2 kt | 0% | |
| Guido Hannah of Cowes | west | 17 h | 18 Sep 07:00 | 18 Sep 23:00 | 16.0 kt | 0% | |
| Daniel Exodus | west | 17 h | 18 Sep 05:00 | 18 Sep 22:00 | 15.6 kt | 0% | |
| Pat Silvermines Hydro | east | 18 h | 16 Sep 18:00 | 17 Sep 12:00 | 12.8 kt | 0% | |
| Etienne Bernard | west | 18 h | 18 Sep 04:00 | 18 Sep 22:00 | 14.5 kt | 0% | |
| Isa Olleanna | west | 21 h | 19 Sep 07:00 | 20 Sep 03:00 | 9.4 kt | 50% | |
| Mara Showgirl | west | 21 h | 18 Sep 22:00 | 19 Sep 19:00 | 11.6 kt | 0% | |
| Louis IE Charge | west | 22 h | 18 Sep 11:00 | 19 Sep 09:00 | 14.2 kt | 0% | |
| Andrea BiBi | east | 22 h | 17 Sep 22:00 | 18 Sep 20:00 | 12.5 kt | 0% | |
| Ertan Miss Beagle | east | 23 h | 18 Sep 03:00 | 19 Sep 02:00 | 10.3 kt | 17% | |
| Gunnar Pompoen | west | 26 h | 19 Sep 15:00 | 20 Sep 16:00 | 8.8 kt | 57% | |
| Matt Tipi Haere | west | 32 h | 19 Sep 16:00 | 21 Sep 00:00 | 8.4 kt | 56% | |
| Henry Privateer | east | 36 h | 18 Sep 16:00 | 20 Sep 04:00 | 8.7 kt | 44% | |
| Guy Spirit | — | — | 18 Sep 14:00 | — | — | — | stopped inside the fork, 122 h so far |
| Selim Help Disabled Children | — | — | — | — | — | — | still to come |
| Pär Lazy Otter | west | — | 22 Sep 17:00 | — | — | — | inside the fork |
The same fork in earlier races
the same entry, exit and sorting line, each race on its own course
2022
east 4 · median 35 h — west 9 · median 26 h
No clear winner: the pairs and the medians disagree. East ahead in 3 of 3 matched pairs, but the lower median is on the west road (26 h against 35 h).
The winner of 2022: Kirsten Neuschäfer went west.
2018
east 3 · median 19 h — west 12 · median 19 h
No clear winner: no two boats on different roads entered within 6 hours of each other; medians 19 h west, 19 h east.
The winner of 2018: Jean-Luc Van Den Heede went west.
Here before · Damien went west in 2022 and west again this year. Pat went east in 2022 and east again this year. Ertan went east in 2022 and east again this year.
How it is measured
A boat is timed from the Lanzarote mark, at the moment the boat’s track passes closest to it, to 100 nm further along the course: a point in YB’s distance to finish, 100 nm less than the tracker showed at the mark, each race on its own course. That is the same progress whichever road a boat took, which a line on the chart would not be. The hours are the time between the two.
A boat’s time at a point falls between two position reports, four hours apart for most of the race, and is worked out from how the distance to finish changed between them. So hours are given whole, and an hour or two between two boats is within what the reports can show.
The roads: east: crossed 28°24′N east of 14°00′W · west: west of it. The first crossing sorts a boat, in every year alike.
A matched pair is two boats that took different roads and entered within 6 hours of each other: the same weather, a different road. A road is named as ahead when it wins at least two matched pairs in three, of at least 3, unless the other road has the lower median by half an hour or more; otherwise there is no clear winner, and the numbers are shown all the same.
Left out of the comparison, and listed with the reason: a boat whose race ended inside the fork, a boat that lay 12 hours or more at one place inside it, and the boats still to come.
The wind is model wind from Open-Meteo at each boat’s reports between entry and exit, never measured on board; light air is under 8 kt. A model does not see an island’s wind shadow or the acceleration along its shores, which is much of what a choice like this one is about.
A road is always sailed by a skipper in a boat. This shows what happened, not what another boat would have found on the other road.
Biscay
North or south across the Bay?
From the start at Les Sables-d’Olonne to Cape Finisterre, the north-west corner of Spain, the fleet crosses the Bay of Biscay: stay north, in open water, or go south toward the coast of Spain.
South came out ahead: 37 of 54 matched pairs, by 16 h in the typical pair, and the lower median (4 d 23 h against 5 d 11 h).
North
6 boats
median 5 d 11 h
South
10 boats
median 4 d 23 h
Matched pairs
37 of 54
south ahead · north in 15 · 2 level
Model wind found
10.7 · 10.5 kt
north · south; light air 44% · 38% of reports
Time through the fork
a dot a boat, a row a road · the bar is the road’s median
Matched pairs
the whole fleet entered together, at the start
South ahead in 37 of 54 matched pairs, north in 15, 2 level. Fastest north: Andrea, 4 d 13 h. Fastest south: Damien, 3 d 12 h.
Every boat
times UTC, worked out between two reports and given to the hour · model wind between entry and exit
| Skipper | Road | Time | Entered | Out | Model wind, mean | Light air, share of reports | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Damien Solarem | south | 3 d 12 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 10 Sep 00:00 | 11.9 kt | 14% | |
| Pat Silvermines Hydro | south | 3 d 17 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 10 Sep 05:00 | 12.5 kt | 14% | |
| Ertan Miss Beagle | south | 4 d 11 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 10 Sep 23:00 | 10.3 kt | 38% | |
| Andrea BiBi | north | 4 d 13 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 02:00 | 10.3 kt | 48% | |
| Daniel Exodus | south | 4 d 19 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 08:00 | 10.4 kt | 37% | |
| Etienne Bernard | north | 4 d 23 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 12:00 | 10.3 kt | 50% | |
| Guido Hannah of Cowes | south | 4 d 23 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 12:00 | 9.8 kt | 43% | |
| Louis IE Charge | south | 5 d 2 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 15:00 | 10.0 kt | 40% | |
| Guy Spirit | north | 5 d 3 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 11 Sep 16:00 | 11.4 kt | 30% | |
| Henry Privateer | south | 5 d 11 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 12 Sep 00:00 | 9.4 kt | 50% | |
| Mara Showgirl | north | 5 d 18 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 12 Sep 06:00 | 11.1 kt | 32% | |
| Isa Olleanna | south | 5 d 19 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 12 Sep 08:00 | 10.3 kt | 44% | |
| Gunnar Pompoen | north | 5 d 20 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 12 Sep 09:00 | 10.7 kt | 51% | |
| Matt Tipi Haere | south | 5 d 21 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 12 Sep 09:00 | 10.6 kt | 43% | |
| Selim Help Disabled Children | north | 8 d 1 h | 06 Sep 12:30 | 14 Sep 13:00 | 10.3 kt | 52% | |
| Pär Lazy Otter | south | 4 d 16 h | 09 Sep 20:00 | 14 Sep 12:00 | 8.4 kt | 76% | restarted: 4 d 16 h from the restart |
This year’s times run from 12:30 UTC on 6 September, the start time in the tracker’s race setup, which is when the yachts began to leave the marina. The trackers show the fleet getting under way at about 16:00 UTC, so every 2026 time here is about three and a half hours long. It is the same for every boat, so the pairs and the road that came out ahead are not touched; read this year’s times beside those of 2022 and 2018 with that in mind.
The same fork in earlier races
the same entry, exit and sorting line, each race on its own course
2022
north 5 · median 7 d 6 h — south 11 · median 6 d 6 h
South came out ahead: 36 of 45 matched pairs, by 24 h in the typical pair, and the lower median (6 d 6 h against 7 d 6 h).
The winner of 2022: Kirsten Neuschäfer went south.
2018
north nobody — south 17 · median 5 d 1 h
No fork that year: the whole fleet went south.
The winner of 2018: Jean-Luc Van Den Heede went south.
Here before · Damien went south in 2022 (after a restart) and south again this year. Pat went south in 2022 and south again this year. Ertan went south in 2022 and in 2018, and south again this year. Guy went south in 2022 and north this year.
How it is measured
A boat is timed from the start to abeam Cape Finisterre: a point along the course in YB’s distance to finish, each race on its own course. That is the same progress whichever road a boat took, which a line on the chart would not be. The hours are the time between the two.
A boat’s time at a point falls between two position reports, four hours apart for most of the race, and is worked out from how the distance to finish changed between them. So hours are given whole, and an hour or two between two boats is within what the reports can show.
The roads: north: sailed north of 45°48′N at some point west of 5°00′W · south: stayed south of it. Going north of it once is enough, in every year alike.
A matched pair is two boats that took different roads and entered within 6 hours of each other: the same weather, a different road. Every boat entered this fork together at the start, so every boat of one road is paired with every boat of the other. A road is named as ahead when it wins at least two matched pairs in three, of at least 3, unless the other road has the lower median by half an hour or more; otherwise there is no clear winner, and the numbers are shown all the same.
Left out of the comparison, and listed with the reason: a boat whose race ended inside the fork, a boat that lay 12 hours or more at one place inside it, a boat that restarted (the hours then run from the restart), and the boats still to come.
The wind is model wind from Open-Meteo at each boat’s reports between entry and exit, never measured on board; light air is under 8 kt. A model does not see an island’s wind shadow or the acceleration along its shores, which is much of what a choice like this one is about.
A road is always sailed by a skipper in a boat. This shows what happened, not what another boat would have found on the other road.