Alicante gives the exit pistoletazo of the Volvo Ocean Race in a day filled with sensations of skin flower, nerves and competition

Don Juan Carlos fired in Alicante the seven teams participating in the return to the world, under the attentive look of over 40,000 people gathered to follow the departure ceremony of the Volvo Ocean Race.

Alicante, for the fourth consecutive occasion, has marked the start of the Volvo Ocean Race race with the exit of stage 1 between Alicante and Lisbon. Unbeatable conditions of wind in the East between 15- 18 knots in the bay of Alicantina and full sun for a stage start beginning at 2 p.m. and which has been followed from the ground by more than 10,000 spectators who have collapsed the beaches and the flying walk. A real street sports show.

The race has been characterized by the conflict of competition, looking more like a race of Match-Race, with a body-to-body between the seven galactic, than the exit of an ocean race. Despite the fact that a large part of the race between buoys in the Alicantina Bay is maintained first, the Mapfre team, like the Brunel, have been penalized by a tactical situation that caused the Spanish to lose the head of the test momentarily. After this, the Chinese team DongFeng took the interim lead on the way to Lisbon.

21 / 10 / 2017: The day of the Volvo has arrived in Alicante... Sunday 14.00 the departure to Lisbon

Alicante becomes a news center of the world nautical just 24 hours from the departure of the Volvo Ocean Race. The exit for Sunday, 22 October, at 2 p.m. can be followed from the Postiguet beach, the Albufera, Cabo Huerta or from the same Flying Walk of the Race Village.

The organization of Alicante Puerto de Departure hopes to reach the record number of visitors to the Race Village on Sunday morning, with the farewell ceremony of the seven teams from the port of Alicante. Alicante is preparing for an athletic historical day.

20 / 10 / 2017: Mapfre assumes its role as a favorite in the face of the imminent beginning of the Volvo in Alicante

The seven teams participating in this edition of the Volvo Ocean Race (Mapfre patrolling by the two-time Olympic medal Xabi Fernández, AkzoNobel by Brad Jackson, DongFeng by Charles Caudrelier, Vestas 11th Hour by Charlie Enright, Sun Hung Kai Scallywag by David Witt, Turn the Tide on Plastic patrolling by the female Dee Caffari and Team Brunel by Bouwe Bekking have presented themselves to the international and national press in Alicante.

Alicante brings together for the first time the seven patterns of the Volvo Ocean Race 2017 / 18 in the press conference prior to the departure of the race back to the world from the city of the Costa Blanca

The press conference was opened by the Asian team DongFeng with its patron Charles Caudrelier. The French regatist, a specialist in solo races, already knows the taste of victory in this race as a crew member: "I won the Volvo Ocean Race race as a crew member in 2011- 12 aboard the Groupama and in this edition I am the team's patron; I certainly want to win the test. We have confidence in ourselves, I go out in the water with a strong team."

After the French, the newly incorporated - as the patron of the AzkoNobel - Brad Jackson, after the recent fall of the Dutch Testipont, came the turn: "Of course it's a dream for me to navigate this round the world as a pattern and I have all the support of the team & # 8211both the regatists and the land team - and I really want to do it right"Jackson was also in the crisis situation that the team had: "I have not caused this situation."

The Spanish team Mapfre, by the hand of its patron Xabi Fernández, has been received at the conference held in Alicante with a vitola of favorites, something to which Xabi Fernando has preferred to take away importance. "For us it's not a matter of being favorite... we have to sail as well as we can. We are ready and we know that winning this race is always complicated, but we will try it with all our strength.".

The departure of the Regata Vuelta al Mundo will take place on Sunday at 2 p.m. in the bay of Alicante, with a previous farewell ceremony of the crews at the Race Village of Alicante from 11 a.m.