Transat 6.50 leader passes Cape Finisterre
by Event media on 22 Sep 2007
Xavier Haize on Fidelia Assistance - © Pierrick Garenne/Grand-Pavois SW
A classic and awaited scenario, the Cape Finisterre transit is usually accompanied by a clear gap in the fleet. The first skippers start to get into the Portuguese trade winds zone accelerating, when the others are still fighting with the North Spain eastern winds.
Friday morning in the North of Corrogna, we registered not more that... 2 knots of wind when the leaders were had to deal with 25/30 knots wind cavalcade.
Leader Isabelle Joschke (Degrémont Synergie) passed Cape Finisterre Thursday afternoon with a 25/30 knots North/North West regime, conditions that permitted her to impose the tempo to the race despite the heavy sea.
A tempo that few skippers are able to follow, this morning Samuel Manuard (Sitting Bull) was over 12 nautical miles away from the young Franco-German skipper, and Yves Le Blévec (Actual) was 22 nautical miles away.
Many of the favourite skippers might start to cogitate serious: Laureyssens, Deshayes, Hardy, Pella, Després... 12th at the general ranking, Stéphane Le Diraison and his Pogo 2 (Cultisol) still battles with the Protos... A third of the fleet still has to pass over the Cape today.
Koen Van Esch, the flying Dutch of KLM Flying Duchtman suffered a broken spinnaker pole and Koen, ranked 5th at series ranking, navigated since then at a very alarming speed. Koen is fine and will carry on racing despite this.
Transat 6.50 - leading positions at 14:00hrs 21 Sept
1 667 Joschke Isabelle Degremont - synergie - 470nm to Maderia
2 679 Manuard Samuel Sitting bull
3 624 le Blevec Yves Actual
4 618 Laureyssens Peter Ecover
5 198 Hardy Adrien Brossard
6 424 Deshayes Ronan Pco technologies
7 429 Pella Alex Generalitat valenciana
8 630 Cassanas Matthieu Ville de balaruc les bains
9 347 Riou Yann Cameleon
10 617 Despres Fabien Soitec
11 260 Cusin Olivier Energies autour du monde
12 265 Claquin Aloys Vecteur plus
13 348 Sineau David Bretagne lapins
14 539 le Diraison Stéphane Cultisol - institut curie
15 510 Mihelin Andraz Adria mobil too
16 346 Bourgues Laurent Adrenaline
17 612 Quelen Jean-François Galanz
18 575 Burkhalter Clayton Acadia
19 551 Cospen Raoul Dalet digital media systems
20 419 Brennan Nicholas Rafiki
Event website: http://www.transat650.org
If you want to link to this article then please use this URL: www.sail-world.com/37646