For the race leaders, this is the penultimate night of racing. Tomorrow, the port of Gustavia will welcome the skippers as heroes, but the outcome seems so far away and still so uncertain. When we woke up this morning in France and in the middle of the night for the skippers, a glance at the rankings shows that Mutuelle Bleu (Corentin Horeau and Pauline Courtois) leads the debate by 1.7 miles over Skipper MACIF (Loïs Berrehar – Charlotte Yven) and by 6.8 miles over Région Bretagne – CMB Performance (Gaston Morvan – Anne-Claire Le Berre).
“The first three almost tied”
But it’s hard to draw hasty conclusions, as Yann Château explained to the race director. “To establish the rankings, we base ourselves on two reference points, two types of equality lines. The first is perpendicular to the course axis and establishes the gain compared to a course. The second, which is often overlooked, is the gain line which is perpendicular to the wind axis". However, according to him, we are witnessing a "perfect North-South alignment" between Région Bretagne - CMB Performance, Mutuelle Bleue and Skipper MACIF. In short: "we are not far from having the first three tied".
A situation which is proving exceptional after 17 days of racing. In the last few hours, we have noticed small variations in speed, undoubtedly linked to the squalls which are hitting the course. "This long port tack is not closed", assures Yann. There are squalls to manage, the sargassum is more numerous, fatigue is increasing and perhaps there will be a few adjustments to be made". It is time to throw our last forces into the battle with the certainty, according to Francis Le Goff, "that we are no longer fighting against friends but against opponents who must be beaten".
