Vendée Globe

Mich Desj on Foncia gained again this morning since the last ranking. He is further out from the centre of the high pressure and has a little better breeze than Roland Jourdain on Veolia Environnement, who is now 185 miles behind in second place.

They are having anything between 5 and15 knots of wind which will back through the day from S to SE and E increasing. Ahead of them is a line of squalls which will form into a small, active low pressure system. About midday they will see the wind round at the ENE up to 45 knots in the squalls and that is going to stay with them for about 18-20 hours. Conditions have been kind for Jourdain who reported damage to his keel box and the mast bulkhead.

Brian Thompson is back in ‘workshop’ mode too, ready to make repairs to one of his longitudinals on Bahrain Team Pindar. He was making a decision exactly how he was going to carry out the repair and should be under way.

 Armel Le Cleach is going upwind in 20-25 knots – much more breeze than the leaders and has gained about 30 miles this morning, he will see it increase to 35 knots over the course of this afternoon.

Sam Davies on Roxy had a tough night - 330 miles to Cape Horn – she should go round early tomorrow morning – she is riding at the back of a front and had gusts over 40 knots last night and has her hands full. There is a nasty, quite active low pressure system which is developing which will hit Dee Caffari and Arnaud Bossieres and then in turn Brian Thompson – that will give gusts to 55 and maybe 60 knots and may just catch Marc Guillemot at Cape Horn. This system is expected to hit Dee and Arnaud by tomorrow lunch time and be less of a problem by Monday morning. Dee is 7 miles ahead of Arnaud, Brian is 180 miles ahead of her.

Steve White is driving nicely above the high pressure system that he has been stuck with for a couple of days. On Toe in the Water he lost 350 nearly 400 miles, and so has been working hard and has 820 miles to the final gate.

Rich Wilson on Great American III is having15-20 knots westerly winds and is pushing very hard in case he catches it from a very active low pressure system which was sitting above him but protected from it by the high, he believes its going to come south soon and it would give him some very strong headwinds if it did.

In terms of the pace of the race, Michel Desjoyeaux is about 270 miles ahead of the 2004 record set by Vincent Riou and his race average speed for the course sailed so far is about 13.1 knots, which is significantly quicker than Riou’s 11.28 knots average for the whole race, but Desjoyeaux’s average is likely to drop rather than increase over the final quarter of the course.

Here is a summary of what the French speaking skippers said on the radio vacs this Saturday morning:

Roland Jourdain (Veolia Environnement): First time that has happened to me for a long time.   I was under gennaker and mainsail doing around 15 knots, when I hit the sea mammal.  The boat came to a standstill.  The water behind the boat was red.  Got back on course.  Only later did he see that the keel box and bulked at foot of mast cracked, so danger is mast will go through the hull.  Repairing what he can and for the rest modifying the strains.  So has been busy consolidating the bulkhead all day and throughout the night.  Still a  lot left to do, so in all around three days of work and now everything is black. Had to stop because dust makes his skin itch.  Could do with a vacuum cleaner. Looks like he's come out of a coal mine. Can't complain, because it wasn't a technical problem.  He entered the mammal's territory, that's all.  This repair work is bound to slow him down.  Doesn't know yet whether after repairs, he will be back to 100%.  At least whether has helped, as calm seas. Thinks he should finish main repair job this evening.

Arnaud Boissières (Akena Vérandas): Conditions have improved over past couple of hours.  A bit sleepy, as phone woke him.  Yesterday had some work to do with batteries and doesn't really see the Horn as a time to relax.  Cannot see Dee now, but they were very close at the gate.  Talked to her when they were at the gate.  Expecting stronger winds gradually building  over next 24 hours.

Michel Desjoyeaux (Foncia): Not very fast but accelerating gradually over the past hour and a half. Will be heeled over until the Doldrums.  The weather ahead is not as simple as he thought when he passed the Falklands.  Temperature around 20°C.  Hasn't worked out how long it will take to reach - maybe around 20 days.  Anything can still happen, so is carrying out inspections and hoping everything will hold out. A few minor bits of work, but nothing serious.

Jean-Yves Chauve (Race Doctor): Two types of tiredness.  Temporary following something precise and then a long-term problem with stress, noise and lack of regular sleep. Freeze-dried food may not please in terms of taste and after a while can affect digestion.  Water is cold to drink, so often the sailors do not drink enough.  A lack of exercise for legs can lead to tiredness in the legs too.  Careful preparation can help, particularly in first two months of the race.  Exercises necessary to keep muscles in shape particularly for leg muscles.

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