"Our downwind zigzag continues with the wind directly behind us on the route to France, so we must gybe back and forth, increasing the distance by nearly half to actually get there. Went to solent and two reefs in the main today, averaging 11 knots. May reduce sail through the night to be conservative. Got a bit of sleep this afternoon at the chart table, and trying to keep up the nutrition and fluid intake. Should have half moon light, although cloudy, for half of tonight. "

Rich Wilson (Great American III) in his daily message

Jean-Pierre Dick's Paprec-Virbac 2 is due to arrive back in Lorient today and will go back into the shed she left last October before setting out for the Vendée Globe. The boat and mast left Le Havre on Wednesday by road. The mast reached Lorient on a long loader yesterday evening. The blue monohull, which was forced to retire from the Vendée Globe on 1st January is being transported on a special trailer to enable the boat to pass under all the bridges. Some parts of the cradle put in place in New Zealand had to be removed to enable the total height to be reduced to below 4.6 m. Once back in her shed, Paprec-Virbac 2 is due to undergo a spring refit.

Raphael Dinelli has finished repairing his broken boom, which should enable him to continue the race in reasonable shape. After preparing all the pieces of the boom, he placed them inside his boat to take advantage of the temperature of around 25° to get them to dry quickly. By yesterday everything was dry and the repair seems to have gone smoothly. He still had to manoeuvre the boom out onto the deck and get it back in place. The sea conditions and wind were good and should have enabled this operation to run smoothly. As for his physical well-being, Raphaël is suffering from a broken rib and said yesterday that he had not been able to get much sleep, as it is painful for him to lie down. The skipper of Fondation Ocean Vital is due to be contacted this morning and should give us more details about his repairs and physical condition.

Based on this morning's weather charts and positions, Météo France has come up with the following ETAs for the next three boats.
- Great American III: Between 12h00 GMT on Sunday 8th March and 18h00 GMT on Monday 9th
- Fondation Océan Vital: Between 12h00 on Tuesday 10th and 12h00 on Thursday 12th
- Nauticsport-Kapsch: Between 12h00 on Thursday 12th and 12h00 on Saturday 14th March
 

Determined to sail his monohull back to port alone, Derek Hatfield set out from Hobart aboard Algimouss-Spirit of Canada 6 days ago. He has been suffering upwind conditions with a lot of slamming, but it is a problem with the autopilots that is his major concern today. "The first night proved challenging when the autopilots would not drive the boat under true wind setting so it was difficult to get any rest or to work on the other systems on the boat. The autopilots have still not been resolved after 6 days at sea and we are now without wind instruments so the decision has been made to make a stop, this time in New Zealand to try once and for all to sort the electronics out before setting off again. Alone in the southern ocean is not a place to be when the boat is not completely sorted, the conditions here are unforgiving and these boats are so finely tuned that if you leave yourself exposed for any length of time something will break."

As planned, Vincent Riou's PRB returned to her home port earlier this week. The boat was unloaded from the cargo vessel on Saturday evening and thanks to the help of the crew the operation went smoothly. At 21h30, PRB was lowered into the water in the commercial harbour in Lorient, then taken to the submarine base, where she spent the night. The following morning the team delivered PRB to Port La Forêt. The keel of the boat, which was also transported by the Russian cargo ship, was due to arrive in Port la Forêt later.