The game will have been tight all the way to the end... While Dongfeng Race Team had taken the lead of the rankings on Friday from the start, it was almost 50 miles behind the head of the fleet on the morning of Sunday 24th June 2018. Charles Caudrelier and his crew took a completely different route from Team Brunel and MAPFRE. But finally, at 4:28 pm, 13 miles from the finish line, this final leg of the Volvo Ocean Race between Gothenburg and The Hague finally fell into the Chinese camp.
The Franco-Chinese crew thus won their first stage victory since leaving Alicante in October and at the same time won the 2017-18 edition of the crewed round the world race. A magnificent victory that they owe to taking maximum strategic risk when negotiating the zones forbidden to navigation in the North Sea.
And yet 24 hours earlier, it was almost on a par with MAPFRE and Team Brunel that Dongfeng Race Team crossed the course mark under Norway and attacked the North Sea sprint to the Netherlands. But the crew in the red boat stood out from its rivals by choosing a strategic route, guided by Marcel Van Triest, the team's weather specialist. They sailed east along the DST North Germany TSS 1, a vast zone off the German and Dutch coasts, where MAPFRE (the latter after hesitating) and Team Brunel chose to go west.
On one side, to the east, more road, but a better wind angle along the German and then Dutch coasts and above all no manoeuvres to be made between now and the finish, on the other side, to the west, less road, but a slightly less favourable angle and a few gybes to reach The Hague. Dongfeng Race Yeam found itself in 5th position in the fleet, but made an incredible comeback early in the afternoon of 24th June, gradually recovering the miles behind its rivals.
The suspense lasted around fifteen hours until the red boat finally took power before setting off on a final triumphant tack, all sails out, at 15 knots on starboard tack.
After 3 days 3 hours 22 minutes and 32 seconds of an intense final stage Dongfeng Race Team crossed the line at 17:22'32 French time, recording its first stage win and giving China its first victory in the race. Team AkzoNobel, in front of his home crowd, took second place in the stage ahead of MAPFRE and Team Brunel, the latter finishing second and third in the final overall classification and obviously extremely disappointed by this fatal outcome.
On the other hand, needless to say that Charles Caudrelier, winner of his second crewed round the world race, his first as skipper (he won with Franck Cammas on Groupama in 2011-2012), wasn't denying his pleasure and relief when it came to commenting on this success, snatched at the end of the tightest final in the history of the Volvo Ocean Race:" "I'm very pleased with the results of this race I just can't believe it. We've had so much frustration in the last nine months. We've never managed to win a leg, we were often in a good position at the start and we lost stupid points, as a skipper it was hard to live with. It was the same thing on this stage: we attacked it with a good advantage over the others, maybe we thought too much about controlling MAPFRE, so we let the others come back. So we said, 'No, it's not possible, we can't lose'. With ten minutes to go, I thought something was going to happen, but we won."
"Before the start we had a clear idea of where we wanted to go, Marcel Von Triest (the onshore navigator) pushed us a lot in this choice. We hadn't followed him on the transatlantic leg, which had cost us points, so there we said to ourselves "Let's have confidence! Nobody followed him, we were surprised, what a fantastic final!" A fantastic finale made possible by a whole team: "Thanks to my team, they did a great job, thanks to Dongfeng for trusting me from the beginning and allowing me to lead this dream team, I am so proud of what we have achieved together. It's really a team work, I'm not sure if I'm the best skipper, but I'm sure I have the best team around me"
At her side, the Dutch Carolijn Brouwer, the first woman, together with Marie Riou from Brest and Justine Mettraux from Switzerland, to win the Volvo Ocean Race, and on home soil, added: " What a crazy stage and what a crazy race! We've always said that if we wanted to win a stage in this Volvo Ocean Race, this would be it, we're there today and we're winning the race! I can't describe how I feel, my goal was to win this race, to be the first woman to do it, it's great. I thank the team that has always been behind me, I couldn't have done it without them." . Also asked about the turning point of this last stage, she commented: " When we moved away from MAPFRE, it was a very intense moment, we had studied very thoroughly that moment when we had to decide between going along the coast or further offshore, we thought we had to make the first choice, we were confident."
The ranking of the 11 e and final stage Gothenburg - The Hague:
1. Dongfeng Race Team (Charles Caudrelier) 3 days 3 hours 22 minutes and 32 seconds
2. team AkzoNobel (Simeon Tienpont) at 15'59"
3. MAPFRE (Xabi Fernandez) at 16'53"
4. Team Brunel (Bouwe Bekking) at 23'20"
5. Turn the Tide on Plastic (Dee Caffari) at 34'25"
6. Sun Hung Kai / Scallywag (David Witt) at 39'00''
7. 11 th Hour Racing jacket (Charlie Enright) at 43'04"
The final general classification of the Volvo Ocean Race:
1. Dongfeng Race Team 73 points
2. MAPFRE 70 points
3. Team Brunel 69 points
4. team AkzoNobel 59 points
5. Vestas 11th Hour Racing 39 points
6. SHK / Scallywag 32 points
7. Turn the Tide on Plastic 32 points
