TeeJayVee update

From Le Havre, James Boyd files news and images from the start pits of the Transat Jacques Vabre

The form revisited

It's official. We have no idea who is going to win the Transat Jacques Vabre in either the Open 60 or 60ft trimaran classes. The fleet is wide open in both camps.

Among the Open 60s many people are rating Bernard Stamm's Bobst Group - Armor Lux, the only Open 60 to have been designed by Pierre Rolland, the most prolific designer in the Mini class. The boat is best known for setting a new monohull west to east transatlantic record of 8 days 20 hours 55 minutes and a new 24 hour record sailing at an average of 17.49 knots. The boat is looking superb and her Swiss skipper is hot.

Another Vendee Globe skipper Joe Seeten has graduated up from Jean-Luc van den Heede's narrow ketch and has acquired the use of Marc Thiercelin's Somewhere for the race. This Open 60, now renamed Sollac Atlantique is a Groupe Finot design and sistership to Mike Golding's Ecover and every bit as potent. Seeten's secret weapon is his crew - Eric Drouglazet was winner of this year's Solitaire du Figaro, widely regarded as the world championship of singlehanded sailing.

With the given light conditions many feel that the time may have come for Temenos, Dominique Wavre's Open 60. This boat was originally built for the Vendee Globe and fitted with a keel-stepped rotating wingmast. This was too heavy and the Whitbread veteran (ex- UBS Switzerland, Merit, Intrum Justitia) and former America's Cup coach has replaced it with a fixed rig that is around 2m taller than her rivals and is lighter, enabling Wavre to lose weight from the keel. Being able to fly more canvas than her competitors will certainly be a benefit on what could potentially be a very light wind leg if the north easterly trades have still failed to form.

Sill Plein Fruit (below) is probably favourite. Roland Jourdain's red Marc Lombard design was dominating the EDS Atlantic Challenge until she dropped her rig. She has a new lighter mast and new lighter sails that has enabled her shore team to remove 150kg from her keel, a move that only improve her downwind potential. They have Benoit Petit, former 470 and Fireball World Champion, as their tactical adviser.