Volvo Hong Kong to Hainan Race 2025 Starts

After a hiatus of seven years, the Volvo Hong Kong to Hainan Race 2025 got underway this morning in an easterly breeze of around 5 to 7kts. Four boats made a clean start at 1120hrs in Hong Kong's stunning Victoria Harbour, going on a fast 390nm downwind passage to Sanya, on the southern Chinese island of Hainan.

The start was relatively sedate – with 390nm to their destination, the fleet played it safe as the gun sounded, ensuring no boat was over the line. Hugues de Saint Germain’s A40 RC Ocean's Five was the first boat crossing the start line.

However, the wind picked up to around 12kts at Hung Hom, Fenice chased from the back. By the time the boats approached Lei Yue Mun gap, Fenice and Ocean's Five were virtually match racing their way through the channel, with Jianghe Teng’s Comar Comet 51s Jiu Ling Yun, which was just renamed Team Sanya following up. Last through the gap was Johnson Yuen’s Hanse 370 Zoe, the lone PHS entrant.

At 1530hrs, Fenice were sailing at around 10kts and had knocked 34nm off their 390nm journey to Sanya on Hainan Island in China. They are followed by Ocean's Five in 8kts and Team Sanya in 8.4kts.

An intense winter monsoon is gradually affecting southern China and a strong north-easterly breeze is expected to fill in by Thursday night, giving champagne sailing conditions with 25kts of breeze and a big sea state of up to 3 metres of wave.

Hugues de Saint Germain, skipper of Ocean's Five talked to us about the challenges of this race: “The forecast is high wind and high seas, but our boat is designed for that. We'll be still aiming to go offshore quickly to catch the wind and to catch the current and then we'll see depending on the wind, if it is too strong, we'll turn right closer to the coast. Our main challenge would be maintaining the speed without broaching or doing an accidental gybe.”

Philippe Grelon, the navigator on board Fenice, had a different strategy in comparison. “We’ve got a very heavy boat, so we have to go fast, as two other competitors can go very fast as well. We will try to keep on the rhumb line, but we will probably go a bit offshore. We have to maintain the right angle with our spinnaker. If we can do that, we will try to go a little bit offshore and then back to the rhumb line.”

The Volvo Hong Kong to Hainan Race takes competitors on a 390nm historically downwind passage to Sanya, known as the “Hawaii of the East”, which is a great finish location for a holiday and a famous hub for yacht tourism. The race record of 23h 31m 52s is held by Seng Huang Lee / David Witt’s Scallywag in the 2016 edition.