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24 hours after the leg has ended, in the wake of a podium finish, one of the most stressful on record in Auckland -although not in New Zealand as a whole as the 2006 finish in Wellington saw “Movistar” and “ABN AMRO One” finish with just 9 seconds between them, which still stands as the shortest gap for any leg finish in the 40-year history of the round-the-world regatta- and the teams are focussing on building the crews back up physically whilst the shore crews are following a gruelling schedule to get the boats back on the water and back to one hundred percent in just 72 hours for racing on Thursday. The marathon will kick off again for “Telefónica” with the crew back racing in the official training race on Thursday, the Pro-Am and in-shore on Friday and Saturday respectively and the start of the 5^th leg from Auckland to Itajaí (Brazil) on Sunday 18^th March.

Reflections on the leg

To sum up, all of the crew on “Telefónica”, starting with the boat's skipper, are feeling good after the result logged on the leader board for the leg, where a podium finish was a magnificent achievement after bobstay problems that forced the crew to stop, repair and restart, going from behind on the leeward side on a very tough leg indeed with lots of upwind sailing and choppy seas, giving both the boat and her crew a hard time.

“We began the leg when we set out from China in a fairly comfortable position for us. We began in a relaxed manner, as we always do, but things really got tricky for us early on with a few problems and breakages that beyond merely dropping back, meant we took our eyes off the ball and put us in a situation that we didn't want to be in. That's where the leg began to throw up some issues for us”, sail skipper Iker Martínez the day after the leg had finished.

One of the most important moments on the leg in the words of the Basque skipper was in Taiwan: “When we got to Taiwan we had to take a very important decision. There were two options and it was a difficult decision considering there were still more than ten days of racing ahead... the met info we had to make the decision with didn't give us any guarantees that the decision we were making would be the right one. We made a plan and we thought we'd be able to see it through and then we corrected it because we thought that we might be the only boat to go directly South . We had to react pretty quickly. We did what we did because at that moment in time, we thought it wasn't wise to take that big a risk and moved back in to the rest of the fleet with a bigger loss in miles than we thought we'd have and that also put us back in a position that we didn't want to be in. It was a decision that we had to take very quickly, but once it was done I think that we did the right thing and valued the risk involved correctly”, explained Martínez.

“Even when we weren't in such a great position, the mood on board has always been good and everyone was clear that we had to fight”, continued the skipper of “Telefónica”. "We've always said that winning a leg when everything goes your way is much easier than getting back on the right track when things aren't going your way and getting a positive result. That's what we did here and that's why we're so happy”.

The positive result Iker talks about: a podium position that means that the team are still in top in the overall rankings with a comfortable lead of 18 points now over French entry “Groupama” with the New Zealanders now in fourth place, 23 points from the Spaniards.

“Telefónica” has an incredibly high percentage of points, having taken 121 of a possible 144 points, which means 84% of the total points.

Bets on the Solomon Islands, key to the leg

Confiding in the power of the boat, patience to wait for the right moment and attacking when possible, for example when passing through the Solomon Islands, was the key to a comeback that allowed the boat to fight for the podium which halfway through the leg looked more than tricky, with immediate rivals “Puma”, “Camper with Team New Zealand” and “Abu Dhabi” had managed to gain up to 200 miles on the windward side, therefore taking control of the routing South. In the end it was a tiny gap with the Kiwis, just 93 seconds, enough to consolidate the great job done by the whole crew for over 20 days of racing between Asia and Oceania.

Iker Martínez spoke about the moment the team decided where to take on the Solomon Islands: “When it came to the Solomon Islands, we'd always thought that the ideal passage would be to the East and to make our way down form there, but the situation was changing and another option became clear, which was to go through the middle, where our greatest fear was of the unknown as we didn't know what we might come across. We evaluated the situation and we decided to go that way. In the end it was a great call because we were able to move closer to the leaders and we also stopped dropping back, which is what would have happened if we'd gone the other way. The passage through was also fairly calm, despite some lows and islands and we only slowed down a little bit. It was the right choice and a good point at which to get back up closer to the frontrunners”.

Thinking about the leg to Brazil

Another important point to consider with this leg is the state of the boats. In “Telefónica”'s case the boat is in good technical shape as it faces one of the longest legs on the round the world regatta, Leg 5 between New Zealand and Brazil, and that's good news for all of the shore crew. They will have the boat out of the water for just three days and any significant damage or issues would mean a massive handicap for the racing programme in Auckland ahead of the start towards Cape Horn, the key point on this fifth leg which finishes in Itajaí (Brazil).

The crew's in good shape, tired from the mammoth effort sustained over these past 20 days of competition and aiming to gain weight and strength during these few days on shore. They are all very close-knit and provide a sense of balance for one another which motivates everyone, even when things aren't going the team's way. It's a virtue of this crew which has really helped the guys during the rough times and when crucial decisions have had to be made.