Vendee Globe - Form Guide

Ed Gorman completes our race preview with a look at the other front runners

If it's not going to be Mike, Ellen or Michel Desjoyeaux, who else might do the business in the Vendee?

Catherine Chabaud (FRA), Whirlpool

Chabaud, 37, has a good Marc Lombard boat and the experience of the last Vendee when she was the last of the finishers, becoming the first woman to complete a non-stop single-handed round-the-world race. Since then she has done well, just missing out on winning the 1999 Transat Jacques Vabre with Luc Bartissol and then winning the Fastnet Race overall. But Chabaud may struggle to handle the pace in the Vendee and there are question marks over her motivation with personal commitments at home making it difficult for her to focus on the race. Whirlpool was built in 1998 and has a relatively conventional fixed mast with a swing keel and two daggerboards. The boat was dismasted in the 1998 Route du Rhum and has since undergone considerable modification partly designed to make it more manageable. The boom has been shortened and the roach reduced in the mainsail. In Les Sables there have been some last minute problems with the keel.
Could make the top five.

Thomas Coville (FRA), Sodebo

Coville, 32, has vast experience in the Admiral's Cup, the America's Cup and the grand-prix multi-hull circuit. He was on board Olivier de Kersauson's Sport-Elec when it broke the Jules Verne record and he also has a long pedigree in short-handed racing. He was second overall in the 1997 Mini-Transat and was the top newcomer in the 1998 Figaro series. His most recent big successes were his win in the 1998 Route du Rhum (when he took over from the injured Yves Parlier in the Open 60 Aquitaine Innovations), and victory in the 1999 Transat Jacques Vabre with Herve Jan. Coville is also something of a reluctant competitor, preferring the multi-hull scene to the Vendee but he is a very competitive sailor and will get stuck in. Sodebo was designed by Finot-Conq and built in 1998 and has not been without problems. It was originally designed with a canting mast which was declared illegal. The boat now has a high-performance multi-hull-style rig with a rotating mast, no spreaders, two stays and a double-runner. But the first version of this fell down in this year's single-handed trans-Atlantic
race.

Could win.

Thierry Dubois (FRA), Solidaires

Dubois, 33, was among three competitors rescued in the Southern Ocean in the last Vendee after he capsized. Dubois won the 1993 Mini-Transat and was fourth in this year's single-handed transat. Despite completing only one major race in the past four years he has trained intensively on Solidaires and has already clocked 25,000 miles on the boat, most of it single-handed. He is a tough competitor who will keep going, though he lacks the extra element of racing ability that could secure a win. Solidaires was built in 1998/99 and incorporates a steel swing keel and a double-spreader carbon rig. The twin rudders are retractable and both the Solent and the staysail are battened. The boat is "unsinkable" with 15 watertight compartments. Will go well upwind but may struggle for pace downwind.

Could make the top five.

Bernard Galley (FRA), voila.fr

Galley, 38, could be the surprise package of this race. He is sailing the old Geodis which Christophe Auguin raced to a runaway victory in the last Vendee. It is a proven fast hull from the Finot board in 1994 which has now been thoroughly updated with the addition of a swing keel, twin daggerboards and a new mast. Preparation has been thorough with just about everything else updated too and ominously little work underway in the last days before the start. Galley is a yacht-broker who is French-Swiss. He took part in the 1992/93 Vendee and completed the course with two repair stops. He has raced in the Figaro and was aboard French Kiss in the 1986/87 America's Cup. Galley's previous experience of the Vendee plus a proven boat could work.

Possible top three.

Josh Hall (GBR), EBP/Gartmore

Hall, 38, has long experience in single and short-handed sailing who has recently relocated from the English east coast to France. He sailed in the 1998 Around Alone in Gartmore but was dismasted in the early stages of leg three. Previously he was rescued in leg one of the 1992 BOC when his boat hit a container and sank. Hall lacks racing ability and drive in this company and is not at his best in the Southern Ocean. But he has a simple and powerful boat with the same set of North Europe sails as Mike Golding on Team Group 4. Gartmore has a fixed mast and fixed keel and an improved PBO rig.

Possible top six.

Roland Jourdain (FRA), Sill

Jourdain, 36, or "Bilou" as he is known is a tough competitor who will run with the best of them in the challenging conditions of the Vendee. He was second behind Ellen MacArthur in the single-handed transat this year and fourth in the 1999 Transat Jacques Vabre, a race which he won in 1995. He has raced extensively in the Figaro class and completed two Whitbreads on Fasizi and Cote d'Or. Jourdain is a rock solid sailor who is very at home alone on the water and is well-prepared. Sill was built in 1999 to a design by Marc Lombard and is a sistership to Chabaud's Whirlpool. The boat has a carbon wing mast with asymmetric daggerboards. There has been some last minute work on the rig at Les Sables.

Possible winner.

Yves Parlier (FRA), Aquitaine Innovations

Parlier, 40, is lucky to be alive after a paragliding accident two years ago left him with serious injuries which still affect him. Known as "ET" in France because of his uncanny ability to read the weather, he has an extraordinary sailing CV with numerous wins in short-handed and single-handed racing including the Figaro, the Route du Rhum, and the single-handed trans-Atlantic. He competed in the 1992/93 Vendee when he was fourth and the last race when he was not classed after stopping to make repairs to the rig on Aquitaine Innovations. In recent years Parlier has been blessed with ill-luck and seems to have lost the knack of getting everything together in the right order. A brilliant sailor, he is also erratic and unpredictable and could blow it from a winning position. Aquitaine Innovations was built in 1996 to a design by Finot and is still among the lightest of the Open 60s in the fleet, despite struggling to comply with the new safety rules which have required Parlier to add considerable weight. The first boat to sport deck spreaders, it incorporates "intelligent" auto-pilots, and a re-usable energy system and it has undergone major recent modifications. However it was dismasted in the single-handed transat this summer and has now been fitted with a relatively unproven wing mast.

Could win, could come seventh.

Marc Thiercelin (FRA), Activewear

Thiercelin, 40, is another Frenchman with long experience in the solo scene with campaigns in the Figaro circuit when he has never been out of the top-10. He was second in the last Around Alone race behind Giovanni Soldini and was second in the last Vendee Globe when he won great plaudits for his brave attempts to find the missing Canadian skipper Gerry Roufs in the Southern Ocean. Thiercelin was a disappointing eighth in this year's transat. Activewear was built in 1998 and has the same hull as Team Group 4. It is fitted with a rotating wing mast with deck spreaders and a swing keel and should go well downwind. A well-proven boat but Thiercelin is underrated by his own countrymen.

Possible top-three.

Dominique Wavre (Swiss), Open Suisse UBP

Apart from Golding and MacArthur, Wavre, 45, is the non-French entry most likely to end the French monopoly in the Vendee. He is a seasoned competitor with four Whitbreads, eight Tour Voiles and four Figaro series to his name and was second overall in that championship in 1997. He was also coach to the French Le Defi America's Cup team in 1995. Wavre has huge experience in the Southern Ocean and in single-handing and could do very well. Open Suisse UBP was built in 1999 and is one of the very latest Finot-Conq designs. It has a keel-stepped wingmast and a fixed keel and a sophisticated sail inventory in Cuben Fibre. However it may be overbuilt and Wavre had problems in the transat when he broke his boom and could only finish ninth.

Possible winner.