|
|
|
|
|
Round Britain & Ireland 2006 Course
|
The RB&I course takes competitors about 2000 miles clockwise round the British Isles stopping at four ports en route.
|
Leg 1 runs from Plymouth to Kinsale; a distance of about 230 miles. The boats leaves Plymouth Sound via the Western Entrance, round the Eddystone Lighthouse and sail west 90 miles to the Isles of Scilly. After rounding Bishop Rock the course runs north for 130 miles to Kinsale on the south coast of Ireland where the competitors have a compulsory stopover of 48 hours.
The faster boats should take less than 24 hrs for this leg arriving on Monday morning, while the slower boats could take 2 days.
Leg 2 from Kinsale to Castlebay on Barra in the Outer Hebrides is a distance of over 440 miles.
The course runs west from Kinsale to the south west corner of Ireland (around 90 miles), then north for 170 miles to Eagle Island off the west coast, and then north east round Northern Ireland to Barra Head and Castlebay at the southern end of the Outer Hebrides (180 miles).
This leg will spread the boats with the fastest arriving on Friday while the slowest could take to Sunday to reach Barra.
Leg 3 is 420 miles from Castlebay to Lerwick in the Shetland Islands. Competitors retrace their track south to round Barra Head before turning northwest 80 miles to St Kilda (Rockall is omitted in this race), then north east 300 miles around the Outer Hebrides and the many rocks and islands to the north of Scotland and on to Muckle Flugga (the northern point of the Shetland Islands). From there it is less than 30 miles down the east coast to Lerwick.
|
Round Britain & Ireland Course
|
Leg 4 is an almost straight run down the east coast of Scotland and England to Lowestoft, a distance of about 470 miles.
The final leg 5 takes the competitors just over 300 miles across the Thames estuary and down the English Channel (omitting the Channel Islands) and home to the finish off the Royal Western Yacht Club in Plymouth.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
