Yesterday (17 August) competitors in the ninth annual Archipelago Raid left Stockholm, and took advantage of 8 to 12 knots of westerly wind and headed northeast out into the Archipelago.

Although almost half of the teams (out of a total of 26) are Swedish, it was three foreign teams that came off best immediately following the start. Team Cobalt, comprised of Brits Luke Yeats and Conrad Humphries, was first to cross the starting line and head downwind, with the FG Porsche crew – Belgian sailors Francis Proot and Simon Van Acker – in second place.

Nipping at their heels in third position were Team Audio Networks with British sailors William Sunucks and Simon Farren. It paid off to be close to the pin mark with Team FG Porsche briefly taking the lead at the second rounding for the start of the tack back up to Kyrkviken and the run to the first checkpoint at Bogesund.

The first phase of the race ends in the Stockholm archipelago, after which (early this morning) the boats must cross “Ålands Hav” over to Åland and Finland. They will be back in Swedish waters on Friday when the boats reach Sandhamn. On Saturday afternoon the exhausted crews will finish right back where they started, outside Lidingo in Stockholm, by which time they will have logged over 500 miles of sailing.

For more information, visit www.archipelagoraid.com .