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TRANSAT AG2R

White bread in the North, black bread elsewhere… Only those who chose the northern course from Madeira to Saint Barthelmy have fared well this week. A zone of calm has hit those in the middle of the fleet. Those who chose the southern route are still searching for the elusive trade winds and are headed even further south… and further behind. Some in the south are now more than 500 miles behind the leaders in the north.

A quick review of the fleet standings shows a nearly direct correlation between place and latitude. The farther south a boat is positioned, the farther away from the finish line.

From Phil Sharp now in 5th place with David Krizek on Atlantik F:

“You know you’ve been offshore for a while when you start to forget what day of the week it is. A bit like when you’re on holiday, but where we are now is actually far from a holiday. We are pushing really hard all the time in power reaching conditions and staying focused is crucial at a time like this and not ourselves get too relaxed and into the swing of things as it were. Since the day before yesterday, for the first time in the race we’ve made big gains on the leader, ‘Financo’, having reduced his lead from over 80 miles to 36 from this mornings positions, and now in 6th place!”

“We are polling just ahead of Gildas Morvan and Jean le Cam now, racing ‘Circle Vert’, who have taken a more southerly option and have ended up in lighter winds than us. Obviously with Morvan being my big rival in the Route du Rhum it would be great to keep him behind us again until the finish but this is going to be far from easy since there is still around 2000 miles left to go and anything can happen in this crazy sport dictated by what forces nature throws at us.” — www.philsharpracing.com

Top ten at 05:00 22/04/2008:

1. Financo - Nicolas Troussel / Christopher Pratt, 1844.76.7 to finish
2. Gedimat - Armel Tripon / Dominic Vitttet, 6.2 nm to leader
3. Athema - Erwan Tabarly / Vincent Biarnes, 9.3
4. Defi Mousquetaires - Thomas Rouxel / Erwan Israel, 10.4
5. Atlantik F - David Krizek / Phil Sharp, 31.5
6. Les Mousquetaires - Bertrand de Broc / Gwen Riou, 33.5
7. Suzuki Automobiles - Thierry Cabagny / Corentin Douguet, 45.8
8. Groupe Celeos - Ronan Treussart / Anthony Marchand, 53.3
9. Degremon Suez Source De Talent - Jean Charles Monnet / Alexandre Toulorge, 56.7
10. Cercle Vert - Gildas Morvan / Jean Le Cam, 77.1

www.transat-ag2r.com

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This entry was posted on Friday, May 2nd, 2008 at 8:53 am and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.