Cammas & Proffit mènent toujours la course à la barre de Groupama

Photo : C.Borlenghi / Sea&See.it

In the multihull class currently passing the Canaries, Groupama (Cammas/Proffit) is still out in the lead 40m ahead of now Sergio Tacchini (Fauconnier/Foxall FRA/IRE), and only Belgacom and Geant are in touch still with these two leaders. Biscuits La Trinitaine (Guillemot/Guichard) has risen to head up the next flank but with 96 miles deficit on 4th placed Belagacom.

Bayer Crop Science (Le Peutrec/Cressant) has suffered 1 metre of delamination underneath the aft beam and has stopped in Porto Santo today, but is unlikely to leave until Monday with no shore team there to help them do the repair stratification.

Bonduelle (Le Cam/De Pavant) arrived at Porto Santo at 0300hrs GMT, Banque Populaire arrived at 0340hrs GMT. Foncia arrived at 0410hrs GMT and Bayer CropScience at 0900GMT, Gitana at 0930GMT. Bonduelle (6hrs 15m stop), Banque Populaire (5hrs 35m) and Foncia (5hrs 5m) all set off together at 0915hrs GMT.

• MULTIHULL OPEN 50

The 50ft multihull Mollymawk skippered by British duo Ross Hobson and Andi Newman is now the back marker of the whole fleet, and their goal is to catch up on the Open 50’s before too long !

• MONOHULL OPEN 60’s

After one week of racing and still a good 500m north of the Cape Verde Islands, leader Virbac (Dick/Abiven FRA)has made superior progress over the last 24hrs, the boatspeed overnight never below 10 knots whereas everyone else’s never got above 10 knots, as the Farr 60 skirted the high pressure zone to the East. This morning Dick and Abiven gybed over to get more westing in before hitting the NE Trades and heading South at 22W and 87m in front. Jean-Pierre Dick reported in on progress : "We’ve experienced that in a short period of time you can lose control of everything and go very quickly from pleasurable sailing to a total mess. We did reach 21 knots last night under spi, but then a gust came through and we were on the edge a bit, the aft guardrail got damaged in the end when the spinnaker sheet pulley broke off the deck."

However, big news today is that as of 0600GMT, Sill (Jourdain/Thomson FRA-GBR) had overtaken Ecover (Golding/Thompson GBR) and charged into second place, their Westerly option finally paying dividends. Co-skipper Alex Thomson called in : "We knew we’d overtake Ecover soonenough, but neither Bilou or I feel victorious about being in 2^nd place. We’re happy to be level with Ecover in latitude but our objective is to win the race so until we cross that line first we won’t be happy ! At least it shows that in the end the Westerly option did pay. Virbac are already in the north easterlies but heading towards Brazil dead downwind. Sill is a reaching boat and we will be on a better angle in the trades so we should make some gains and reduce the gap to the leader to under 50 miles."

The high ridge which Virbac and Sill avoided has caught one victim so far ; Ecover, the dominant leader over the last week of racing, was at 22 W already when they found themselves unable to manoeuvre out of the system. They have been able to make only half the boat speed of the rest of the fleet at around 4 - 5 knots, and are suffering from only having 1 spinnaker left on board after shredding two in the last 48 hours. Things are looking bleak for Golding and Thompson as the rest of the 2,500m route to Brazil is downwind. Thompson explained : "Forecast conditions are still very light, northeast winds, maybe 5-7 knots. Unfortunately we’re in a place where the high-pressure ridge is moving south with us, so we are always in light winds. Sill seems to have wind down to the west, which is a good position for later on when the wind does comes back, and they seem to have been getting through the low pressure with less problems, which is an interesting position, but there’s still a long way to go.."

Once the leaders hit the trades, it will be downwind surfing all the way to the Doldrums 1,350m away, and not much except technical problems on the boat itself is going to be able to impede Virbac’s progress at the head of the fleet.

However, all seems not lost for boats just out of reach of the leaders, and skipper Nick Moloney on Team Cowes, a veteran of this race from 2001, has his sights set on getting into the top three in the days to come : "The next 24 hours will be quite a tough transition, I think. As we close the miles on PRB there is a good chance we could come out in third a bit further down the track. We seem to be enough West to be in different weather and to keep moving faster. PRB looks set to run into the same conditions as Ecover and we expect them to slow up, for sure. We are really hoping we can roll past and go into third overall."

Cheminées Poujoulat/Armor Lux has arrived in Funchal this morning at 0800hrs GMT.

• MONOHULL OPEN 50’s

In the 50 foot monohull fleet, Hellomoto (Humphreys/Larsen) is still holding the lead over Storagetek (Guillemot/Salnelle), however have slowed up in headwinds again as they pass the latitude of Madeira, and count a 44.8m lead still. Hellomoto is on the direct route whereas Storagetek are heading directly South off to the East of the course. They too will have to negotiate the tricky high pressure ridge before reaching the NE Trades.

Conrad Humphrey’s update : "I’d hoped we’d be a little further down the track by now. We still have a long way to go but we have to be pretty satisfied with our position overall - a third of the way there, out in front and still in amongst the Open-60 tail-enders. Can’t be bad. The autopilot is holding up nicely and we’re into a good routine now - 4 hours on, 4 hours off with an overlap for key decision-making and sail changes. In our off-watch, we sleep for a couple of hours, cook and write emails - it’s working really well. Now for the trades."

WEATHER FORECAST

Both monohull and multihull fleets will gradually reach the NE Trades and as they get to 20 S the 15 - 20 knot breeze will strengthen. The better sailing angles are to be found more on the direct route. The Doldrums down the track don’t seem to be that active where the boats are heading, but all could change before they reach this notorious meteorological phenomenon.

POSITIONS at 15:00 hrs GMT 09/11/03

MULTIHULL OPEN 60 Pos. / Boat / Name / Latitude / Longitude / Speed / Hdg / DTF / DFL
 1 GROUPAMA 29 02.44’ N 19 23.00’ W 12.8 192 2771.8m
 2 SERGIO TACCHINI 29 21.12’ N 18 36.64’ W 12.1 188 2811.9m 40.0m
 3 GEANT 29 39.44’ N 18 49.80’ W 16.6 199 2823.6m 51.7m
 4 BELGACOM 29 35.96’ N 17 41.64’ W 11.7 183 2845.9m 74.1m
 5 BISCUITS LA TRINITAINE 32 40.60’ N 20 55.72’ W 16.5 190 2950.7m 178.9m   MONOHULL OPEN 60
 Pos. / Boat / Name / Latitude / Longitude / Speed / Hdg / DTF / DFL
 1 VIRBAC 25 26.60’ N 22 07.12’ W 9.4 176 2509.9m
 2 SILL 27 49.72’ N 25 45.92’ W 9.7 207 2597.2m 87.4m
 3 ECOVER 27 44.72’ N 21 50.08’ W 5.8 194 2657.0m 147.2m
 4 PRB 28 15.44’ N 21 55.72’ W 8.1 190 2679.9m 170.1m
 5 TEAM COWES 29 03.80’ N 23 10.76’ W 9.3 212 2707.4m 197.6m

OPEN 50 MULTIHULL
 1 MOLLYMAWK 39 18.72’ N 10 15.16’ W 9.5 175 3562.5m

OPEN 50 MONOHULLS 
 1 HELLOMOTO 34 08.80’ N 16 41.76’ W 5.1 205 3114m
 2 STORAGETEK 34 17.28’ N 15 00.20’ W 9.7 169 3158.8m 44.8m
 3 DEFI VENDEEN 35 18.04’ N 15 44.36’ W 9.4 197 3196.7m 82.7m