A third placed finish in the second leg of the Volvo Ocean Race was satisfactory if not spectacular for Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing, who were unable to crown a glorious homecoming on Saturday.
Azzam sailed into their home port on the Corniche breakwater just after 15:00, but an enthralling three-way battle between them and Dongfeng Race Team and Team Brunel that had developed over the last few days eventually petered out into a two team duel.
Brunel won it, with Dongfeng again having to settle for an agonisingly close second placed finish, crossing the line at 12:41 UAE time yesterday, just 16 minutes behind Bouwe Bekking and his team.
That followed their 12 minute second place finish behind ADOR in the first leg from Alicante to Cape Town.
ADOR finished the second leg after 23 days, 19 hours and eight minutes at sea, two hours and 27 minutes behind Dongfeng and two hours and 43 minutes adrift of Brunel.
Despite admitting he was disappointed, Azzam skipper Walker said the team had secured their aim of a podium finish.
“We’re disappointed because we set out to win, but, I’m also pretty happy too,” said the 44 year old.
“Our goal was to be in the top three in every leg, which we’ve done. As we’ve seen on this leg, it’s not easy sailing these ocean drifts.
“It’s fantastic to be here in Abu Dhabi. I’m really pleased we’ve got three weeks here now. “We’ll certainly need it. I worked out we’ve been at sea 49 of the last 64 days, which is a lot.
One person on board Azzam, in particular, was very excited about the second leg finish, Abu Dhabi’s Adil Khalid.
“It’s such a great feeling to be back home and a great moment for Abu Dhabi.
“Home has always been on my mind. I was dreaming about winning the leg and the top three is a great thing for us.
Congratulations to @ADORlog on the 3rd place & podium finish in their home port! #VOR pic.twitter.com/AR8u5LYCDw
— Volvo Ocean Race (@volvooceanrace) December 13, 2014
“Hopefully we will do well in the next leg and the in-port race too, and we’re looking forward to winning the Volvo Ocean Race.” Navigator Simon Fisher said it had been a “roller-coaster” second leg.
“It’s been a roller-coaster of a leg. We were always optimistic we could get back into it and we really relished this last bit to try and pull off the fairytale ending and bring home the Abu Dhabi boat into Abu Dhabi first, and we got pretty close.
“It’s great (top three). It would have been great to have won, but in the big picture we’ve achieved our objective, we’ve got our podium finish and we’re really happy.”
