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Strong British contingent emerges for the doublehanded Transat Jacques Vabre this November

A strong British contingent is lining up to cross the Channel next month for the sixth Transat Jacques Vabre two handed transatlantic race running between Le Havre in northern France and Salvador de Bahia in Brazil.

Following their successful union in the recent Calais Round Britain Race, Mike Golding will be sailing his new Ecover with Britain's leading multihull racer Brian Thompson. The brand new Owen-Clarke designed Open 60 is now in the UK having just reached these shores from New Zealand by ship and has been a 'feature' at Southampton Boat Show.

Emma Richards has been beevering away over in Cherbourg making good and improving her new Pindar, formerly Graham Dalton's much abused Hexagon. Design-wise the boat is closely related to the new Ecover and was built at the same yard in Tauranga, NZ. Emma's crew has yet to be finalised.

Also announced is the new partnership on Ellen MacArthur's Kingfisher. She has been rechristened Team Cowes and will be sailed by Offshore Challenges Sailing Team skippers Nick Moloney and Sam Davies.

Following his successful Rolex Fastnet Race on board the old Tyco, renamed Hellomoto, Conrad Humphries will be racing the Offshore Challenges Open 50 (formerly JP Mouligne's 1998/9 Around Alone class 2 winner Cray Valley) which Nick Moloney campaigned in last year's Route du Rhum. For this he will be teaming up with fearless Aussie multihull sailor and Mr SailRocket himself, Paul Larsen, who sailed the race two years ago with his fellow Team Philips crewman Alex Bennett.

The biggest surprise is unquestionably Alex Thomson's acquisition of Roland Jourdain's highly potent Lombard design Sill. This means that at present what many consider to be the world's three top Open 60s now reside on this side of the Channel.

Thomson's ultimate ambition is the Vendee Globe and there are few better boats on which to do it. Thomson is a previous winner skipper in the Clipper Round the World Race - hence the youngest skipper ever to win a round the world race - and has hopefully recovered from being beaten by Emma Richards in class two of the Europe 1 New Man STAR in 2000. In that race he sailed Mike Garside's Open 50 formerly called Magellan Alpha. He has since been running Formula 1 Sailing out of Gosport.

As part of the deal to buy the boat the hugely experienced Roland Jourdain will be racing on board as his new Sill, a sistership to Jean le Cam's new Lombard-designed Bonduelle is constructed at JMV Composites in Cherbourg.

Round the world skipper Josh Hall is back on the ocean wave racing with Charles Hedrich on his Open 60 (formerly Gartmore/Pindar,etc). In a sweet deal for Josh the boat has been chartered to Hedrich for two years and has been renamed Objectif 3. As part two of Hedrich's three objectives is next year's Vendee Globe (he has already completed the Paris-Dakar rally on a motorbike and has an ascent of Mount Everest still to come - arguably the Vendee is probably the hardest of the three...)

The star of the show herself, Ellen MacArthur, will once again be racing with Alain Gautier on board the 60ft trimaran Foncia. This boat hasn't had much luck so far this season following a capsize in the Challenge Mondial Assistance and breaking the topmast at the recent Fecamps Grand Prix. She and Gautier came second to Groupama two years ago.

Also racing a trimaran, but one of more modest proportions are Ross Hobson and Andi Newman aboard the double Round Britain Race winning Nic Bailey-designed 40ft trimaran Mollymawk.

The line-up for the Transat Jacques Vabre looks outstanding with 45 boats entered so far comprising 15 60ft tris, five 50ft multihulls, 18 Open 60s and seven Open 50s.

Among the surprises are the debut of Yves Parlier's radical new 60ft catamaran Aquitaine which features a twin mast rig along similar lines to Team Philips. As this radical boat has yet to be launched her participation is a case of we'll believe it when we see it.

There are otherwise some highly talented combinations elsewhere in the 60ft trimaran fleet such as Jean-Luc Nelias and former Fujicolor skipper Loick Peyron on Belgacom, Michel Desjoyeaux and serial round the worlder Herve Jan on Geant and double Route du Rhum winner Laurent Bourgnon sailing with Philippe Monnet on Sopra Group. The latest announcement is that Jean le Cam will be sailing with last year's Solitaire du Figaro winner Kito de Pavant on board Bonduelle (the trimaran as opposed to his new Open 60).

Entries

Open 60 multihulls
1	Aquitaine	Yves Parlier &	Fr
2	Banque Populaire	Lalou Roucayrol &	Fr
3	Banque Covefi	Steve Ravussin & Yvan Ravussin	CH
4	Belgacom	Jean-Luc Nélias & Loick Peyron	B & Fr
5	Biscuits La Trinitaine	Marc Guillemot & Yann Guichard	Fr
6	Bonduelle	Jean Le Cam & Kito de Pavant	Fr
7	Bayer CropScience	Fred Le Peutrec & Julien Cressant	Fr
8	Foncia	Alain Gautier & Ellen MacArthur	Fr & UK
9	Géant	Michel Desjoyeaux & Hervé Jan	Fr
10	Gitana	Lionel Lemonchois & Marc Guessard	Fr
11	Sopra Group	Philippe Monnet & Laurent Bourgnon	CH
12	Groupama	Franck Cammas & Franck Proffit	Fr
13	Sergio Tacchini	Karine Fauconnier & Damian Foxall	Fr & Irl
14	Sodebo	Thomas Coville & Jacques Vincent	Fr
15	TIM	Giovani Soldini & Vittorio Malingri	Ita
Open 50 multihulls
1	anne-caseneuve.com	Anne Caseneuve & Christophe Houdet	Fr
2	Astre	Pascal Quintin & Raphael Sohier	Fr
3	Les Gens d'Ici	Vincent Lantin & David Salle	Fr
4	Mollymawk	Ross Hobson & Andi Newman	UK
5	Vaincre la Mucovicidose	Hervé Cléris & Ronan Delacou	Fr
6	Victorinox	Dany Monnier &	CH
Open 60 monohulls
1	Adecco	Bob Escoffier & Servane Escoffier	Fr
2	Arcelor-Dunkerque	Joe Seeten & Eric Dumont	Fr
3	Armor Lux	Bernard Stamm & Christophe Lebas	CH
4	Ciments St Laurent	Georges Leblanc & Marc Nadeau	Can
5	Ecover	Mike Golding & Brian Thompson	UK
6	Ex-Ecover	N.C	UK
7	L'Heautontimoroumenos	Antoine Koch &	Fr
8	Objectif 3	Charles Hedrich & Josh Hall	Fr
9	PRB	Vincent Riou & Jérémy Beyou	Fr
10	Pindar	Emma Richard & ???	UK & NZ
11	Sill Plein Fruit	Alex Thomson & Roland Jourdai&	Fr
12	60ème Sud	Didier Munduteguy & Juan-Mari Odriozola	Fr & Esp
13	Spirit of Canada	Derek Hatfield & Al Power	Can
14	N.C.	Dominique Wavre & Michèle Paret	CH
15	Virbac	Jean-Pierre Dick & Nicolas Abiven	Fr
16	VMI	Sébastien Josse & Isabelle Autissier	Fr
17	N.C	Karen Leibovici &	Fr
18	N.C	Mike Birch &	Can
19	Skandia	Nick Moloney & Sam Davies.	Aus & UK.
Open 50 monohulls
1	Branec III	Roger Langevin & Henriette Lemay	Fr
2	Photoways.com	Jean-Marie Bouchired & Marie Sergent	Fr
3	Défi Vendéen	Jean-François Durand & Stéphane Chemin	Fr
4	Top 50 Croisières Sportives	Luc Coquelin & Chantal Foligné	Fr
5	Hellomoto	Conrad Humphreys & Paul Larsen	UK
6	Storagetek	Régis Guillemot &	Fr
7	N.C	Ricardo Diniz & Mark Taylor	Por