Volvo Plans Bigger and Better Ocean Race

By Rich Roberts
For YachtRacing.com

GOTHENBURG---Sweden and the Volvo Ocean Race is a love affair bursting with promise, and it's probably going to get better: bigger boats, fewer and briefer stops and a couple of months shorter overall with perhaps a rising sun on the horizon.

"It has been a very good investment," Volvo cars president Hans-Olov Olsson said Wednesday at an eagerly anticipated press conference to discuss the company's future involvement, if any.

While a mid-day crowd of local residents swarmed through the race village outside, Olsson, Volvo Trucks president Jorma Halonen and VOR chief executive Helge Alten spoke before a mass of international media. Speculation beforehand had ranged from the Gothenburg-based automaker dropping out to them continuing their stewardship of the world's premier ocean race with broad upgrades.

The tip-off was that they couldn't stop smiling.

Finally, after initial remarks by Alten and Halonen, Olsson said, "I can announce that we have decided to go ahead with the planning and the organizing of the next Volvo Ocean Race around the globe."

Alten wore an open-collar shirt while Olsson and Halonen

appeared in businesslike suits and ties. Media wore shorts and T-shirts, as it was a summery day that created a sauna-like environment in the Ocean Race Club tent.

If all of the changes being considered come to fruition, the next one starting in 2005 will have a drastically different appearance.

Are you ready for freeze-dried sushi?

"Asia could be important," Alten said. "And if it's Asia we should also say that Japan is important."

Right now Japan, while intriguing, is more likely to figure in a Pacific Rim race Volvo also is considering. Alten ruled out China, including Hong Kong, and Singapore because "most of the racing public there is expatriates---foreigners."

No world sailing race has ever visited Asia, but the VOR's Sweden-based owners are confident enough in the future of the event not only to sink another $30 million into the next one starting in 2005 but to explore new horizons.

That decision was made long before the spectacular response that has exploded in this western Swedish city of half a million. The only question was how to make the whole race better.

Alten said, "We believe that we need to start and finish in Europe, that we need to have two Southern Ocean legs and that we could end up the race somewhat shorter than the present one with fewer and shorter stopovers. The length of the race, I think most of the teams would say, should be adjusted from nine months to six or seven months."

That statement, with its broad reference to "Europe," could jolt the UK, where all of the Whitbread Round the World Races started and finished first in Portsmouth and then in Southampton and even its successor---this Volvo---started last September 23.

The only notion Alten ruled out was a route through the Panama Canal because, he said, "The heritage of the leg is the Southern Ocean."

A good guess is that the next one will start and/or finish in Gothenburg, although this one will end at Kiel next Sunday.

"It's been fantastic here in Gothenburg," Alten said.

No argument there. The sailors have said their reception here after midnight a week ago was the best of the race.

"Unbelievable," Assa Abloy navigator/co-skipper Mark Rudiger said. "The best yet. One [o'clock] in the morning, rainy, cold, and there were more people and boats and activity and excitement than any other stop so far."

Last weekend thousands of locals, with kids in strollers and dogs on leashes, jammed ferries to launch a week-long migration across the river from Gothenburg to the race village at Eriksberg, and Saturday's sendoff figures to see spectator boats wall to wall.

It could be the last fleet start for Volvo 60s.

"We believe that the boats should be monohulls in order to have tight racing and that the boats should be as equal as possible," Alten said. "We're looking into a new, exciting type of high-performance boat which would be fun for the sailors and allow all the participating teams a chance to do well."

Instead of the 64-foot VOR 60s, that could mean boats in the 80- or even 90-foot range.

Alten admitted that having only eight entries this time was disappointing but that organizers had reduced their initial ambition of 15.

"We feel the optimum number is around 10 to 12," Alten said. "That gives everybody in the race a time of glory."

It seems almost certain there will be only one stop in the U.S. next time and that it will be Baltimore-Annapolis, not Miami.

In lieu of nine full stopovers, some ports could become gas-and-go "pit stops," a concept introduced when the fleet checked in at Hobart, Tasmania at the end of the Sydney-Hobart Race before continuing on to Auckland. That and shorter layovers could help to sustain interest.

"We need to make it even more compelling, more interesting to follow," Alten said.

The proposed changes support what some key participants have been advocating.

John Kostecki, skipper of Germany's overall race leader, illbruck, said, "Four or five stopovers would be ideal. One stop in the States is enough. The Miami stopover was terrible. I'd like to see a big change in the boats, too."

Amer Sports One skipper Grant Dalton, a six-race veteran who has said he won't do another on a monohull, suggested, "I'd shorten the stop time, but you have to think of the sponsors. We need time for that.

"Fewer stops, though. One in the U.S.---Baltimore. Can Miami. Can Sydney. Can Kiel. Rio is fine. Rio was good."

Cape Town and Auckland are good bets to remain. Southampton, Kiel and Miami are waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Rudiger said, "[There] probably [should be] just one U.S. stop: Baltimore. We know that's a winner. So far Kiel I could do without, although I haven't been there yet. [Gothenburg] would be the place to stop it."

Skipper Kevin Shoebridge of Tyco: "Nine legs is a lot. It's leaving port and coming into port that are intense times. You've seen a lot of crew changes and a lot of extra pressure to come on and do well. A lot of them stop enjoying it. It's just too hard. They just want to go away."

A larger concern is commercial. Olsson said, "The [present] stopovers cover our major markets, but they also satisfy the sporting side of the sailing, too."

As for bigger boats, Shoebridge added, "I think it's a must. That's one of the reasons there aren't more boats. These boats are great little 60-footers [but] they're not exciting. You have to make some premier ocean racers---85, 90-footers. Put restrictions on them---build only one boat instead of two, fewer sails---and you can do it for the same price."

Alten was clear that there also will be a place for women, despite their struggles in the last two races.

"It is important that they have a chance to compete," Alten said. "We shouldn't forget, though, that the ladies, while they're extremely good sailors, they do not have the same experience as the men or as much depth to draw from.

"But it's important that if and when a new boat is designed that it is designed so the ladies have a better chance of competing. Today they have to lift 1 ½ tons of sails from one side of the boat to the other side when they're tacking or jibing."

All of those decisions will be made in the coming months before the Notice of Race is published in the spring of 2003.