Pahun - untouchable

Local waters benefit race veteran in the Tour Voile

Last night Jimmy Pahun and his crew on Region Ile de France took leg victory into the Breton port of Locmiquelic at 1241 GMT, after a 19 hours 40 minute long tour of the Breton coast. For Pahun this was significant as it Locmiquelic is his home port.

"It's true that I really wanted to impress here, what am I saying, I mean to
win! I think we were a bit more up for it than the others on this leg." He
ended the scene by thanking his 'wonderful team', especially Erwan Tabarly,
Gilda Mahé and Nicolas Troussel.

On board Defi Partage-Marseilles, who arrived second, Thierry Bouchard couldn't
hide his reliefL "This position puts the hope back in all of us. We knew we could make it, but success has run away from us a little since Dunkirk. We sailed to get this place without taking any risks or being too greedy."

Purely by chance, the top two in the overall results were sailing in unison, Bouygues Telecom waiting for the right time to pass Theoule-Mandelieu. As skipper Pierre-Loïc Berthet recounts: "they gybed in Audierne bay and that's the chance we were waiting for. Without following them we managed to overtake. Third place is always good to take on a 2.5 coefficient. Now we'll start another windward-leeward style course and that’s the way we like it!"

The turn of the tide in the Raz de Sein occurred just after the first quarter of the fleet passed, causing a separation in the fleet. The last boat to cross the line at 0239 GMT this morning, two hours after the winner.

This morning a few team changes enabled the challengers to freshen the boats up
a little for today's leg, which took place in a wet 20 knot wind.

Jimmy Pahun's absence on board Region Ile de France didn't affect his team who
managed to come first on this windward-leeward course ahead of Laurent Pagès
and the American team on Groovederci. As a result the former crew have risen to third in the overall results, while Bouygues Telecom, finishing third in the leg, reclaimed the race leader's Blue I Mode Spinnaker from Theoule Mandelieu. The Bouygues Telecom crew is showing real form on the short courses, a fact that they themselves predicted.

In the amateur class, CSC ESSEC remains at the top of the leaderboard ahead of Ville de Geneve Carrefour Prevention. By finishing just one place ahead, the Swiss team are doing everything they can to make up their six point deficit.

Meantime the students on Defi Grandes Ecoles Total INSA made a real hash of their race, allowing the team on Defi Don du Sang Allibert HEC-ESC Grenoble-X to come close to taking over their lead with a sixth place.

It is worth mentioning the fine effort made by the students on Defi Sclerose en Plaques- Leonard de Vinci who took ninth place, which may well have been put down to
the presence of Bruno Troublé at the helm...

There has been a small change in the Challenge AGF ranking. Grooverderci still leads but is now closely tailed by Region Ile de France and Theoule Mandelieu.

The start of Race 11 (104 miles, coefficient 2), will see the fleet head off from Locmiquelic to Port Bourguenay, at 1200 GMT tomorrow (Monday)

Results after leg 9

Pos	Boat	Skipper	Pts
1	BOUYGUES TELECOM	Pierre Loïc Berthet	371
2	THEOULE MANDELIEU	Sylvain Chtounder	369
3	REGION ILE DE France	Jimmy Pahun/Nicolas Pauchet	355,5
4	GROOVEDERCI	Deneen B. Demourkas/Laurent Pages	354,5
5	VILLE DE GENEVE CARREFOUR PREVENTION	Julien di Biase/Denis Girardet	329,5
6	DEFI PARTAGE MARSEILLE	Thierry Bouchard/Dimitri Deruelle	324,5
7	CSC ESSEC	Hervé Gautier	312,5
8	TOULON PROVENCE MEDITERRANEE COYCH	P.L.Garnero/F.Henry	311,5
9	DIEPPE SEINE MARITIME	Romain Gibon	301,5
10	BELVEDERE FORCE EDC LES COPAINS A BORD	Vincent Portugal	275,5
11	COTES D'ARMOR	Vincent Biarnes	262
12	PSA PEUGEOT CITROEN	Eric Blouet	238,5
13	DEFI GRANDES ECOLES TOTAL INSA	Florent Gaggero	236,5
14	PERPIGNAN MEDITERRANEE	Paul Mc Kenzie	232,5
15	BIENNE VOILE	R.Hartmann	231
16	DOUARNENEZ VOILE MAGAZINE	Loïc Le Garrec	226
17	VILLE DU PORT BRED ILE DE LA REUNION	Jean Albert Gabriel/M.Guessard	219
18	DEFI SCLEROSE EN PLAQUES	Stéphane Venel	214,5
18	DEFI DON DU SANG ALLIBERT- HEC-ESC GRENOBLE-X	Philippe Legros	214,5
20	PORT DE COMMERCE LA ROCHELLE ESTUDINES.COM	Pierre François Le Poutre	203,5
20	ESPOIRS AQUITAINS	Xavier Cantegrel/Pascale Dentraygue	203,5
22	NANTES SAINT NAZAIRE	S.Petithuguenin	174
22	ALFA LAVAL	Yoann Richomme/Antoine Cardin	174
24	MARSEILLE UNIVERSITES VILLE DE BANDOL	J.F. chevalier/S.Guignard	171
25	T Service Interim Région de Bruxelles Capitale	J.M.Fobert/L.Declercq	165
26	TEPACAP	J.Grégoire/A.Pallu de la Barrière	157,5
27	DELFT CHALLENGE	Ko Stroo	155,5
28	EIGSI CHARENTE MARITIME	Antoine Albaret	150,5
29	BREST GRANDES ECOLES ENSIETA ENST BRETAGNE	N. Audigane/T. Mahé/M. Riou/C.Pratt	144
30	DEFI JEAN BART	G.Delacroix/T.Ruyant	132,5