Another new leader

Laurent Pellecuer takes Solitaire Affelou du Figaro's third leg to Cork, relegating D'Ali to second overall

Through the light Irish fog and drizzle, Laurent Pellecuer crossed the finish line under spinnaker to take line honours at the end of the third leg of La Solitaire Affelou du Figaro arriving on Sunday 21 August at 08h14m47 seconds local time. After 3 days, 15 hours, 57 minutes and 47 seconds of racing from La Rochelle to Cork, Laurent who was 10th in the overall results, now moves into first place overall with a 9 minute and 39 second lead over Italian competitor and winner of leg 2, Pietro D’Alí on Nanni Diesel.

This was the first time that Pellecuer, who is 31 and from Montpellier in the south of France has won a leg on La Solitaire having competed nine times before. Over the VHF early this morning, Laurent declared “I feel like this is my leg and want to do the perfect race.”

The conditions for the 456 mile course from La Rochelle to Ireland were tough on the skippers with strong headwinds and cross seas, wet and cold, the hulls of their Beneteau Figaro 32 footers constantly pounding the waves. This was combined with some tough decisions to be made on how to approach the ridge of high pressure blocking their path up the Celtic Sea. The 5.2 knot average speed gives an indication of just how tough the conditions were. “The boat slammed into the waves with such force that I was scared it would break in two,” admitted Pellecuer upon arrival.

The first five boats arrived within 26 minutes of each other: Laurent Pellecuer on Cliptol Sport was followed by Yann Eliès on Groupe Generali Assurances, Kito de Pavant on Groupe Bel, Erwan Tabarly on Thales and Jérémie Beyou on Delta Dore. Tabarly and Beyou match raced to the finish line, ultimately just one second separating them.

Those who have lost the most on the leg from La Rochelle to Cork are Gildas Morvan ( Cercle Vert) who won the first leg but who has now plummeted from second to 11th place with a 57m 57s time deficit on the leader; Thierry Chabagny on Lèbres-Bermudes who goes from fifth to 13th place with 1h 49m 52s deficit; Eric Drouglazet on Crédit Maritime, who is now 19th, but lagging by 2h 20m. The 2003 Solitaire du Figaro winner, Armel Le Cléac’h, who opted for a southwesterly approach to the ridge of high pressure on the approach to Crosshaven, is now a lowly 3h 58m 18s off the leader in 24th place.

The 43 Bénéteau Figaro 2s will remain at Royal Cork Yacht Club in Crosshaven until the start of the next leg on Tuesday 23 August.

Finally Sam Davies has got the bit between her between posting a 10th place, 49 minutes and 2 seconds behind Pellecuer. “I’m pretty tired but it was a good race," said Sam. "It went how I wanted it to go this time. I had a bad start but I caught up really quickly. All my tactics worked really well and the boat was going really fast, and so it was easy - it was fun! Approaching the finish, Benoit [Petit] was in front of me as we were coming up to the line. The finish was under a little cliff just before Crosshaven, and he just sailed in to no wind and I drifted around him and finished in front. Normally it’s me that happens to! I’ve had my fair share of bad luck but this time it was my turn to get lucky! I apologised to him when I saw him after the finish because I know from previous races I’ve done how frustrating that is!

“Skandia was really fast – she likes going upwind and she likes it when it’s windy as well," she continued. "Last night was probably the hardest night though cause it was spinnakers all the time and I was really close to Romain (Attanasio) in fact who was just behind me. So it was probably the hardest night in terms of no sleep and being the last night makes it harder. The other nights I played my sleeping quite well, I managed to eat and sleep properly even when it was really rough. It wasn’t really windy, it was 25 gusting 30 maybe, but the waves were massive so it was quite difficult to live onboard but it was all ok in the end.”

She managed to not drop below eleventh position for the entirety of the 356 mile leg: “I’m happy with how I raced. I was just trying to see if I could stay up with the people who were there cause they’re really good. They were going the way I wanted to go myself, so I just said 'okay, I’m just going to see if I can keep up with them for as long as possible'. I was really pleased because I managed to stay with them. It wasn’t like I started at the back and got lucky and ended up with a good result or vica versa - I actually stayed in the front pack for the whole race. I think it’s the first time I’ve done that so I’m really pleased.”

Despite this being the longest leg of the Solitaire so far, it was still very very close. “You can see other boats all the time. There was never a point where I couldn’t see another boat. Normally you can see at least 10 other boats. Last night was unusual actually because I could only see Romain and another boat just behind me, then I could see two boats a fair way in front of us and that was it - the fleet was quite spread out!"

Leg 3 finish times

Pos	Skipper	Boat	Time
		*Arrived at 09:14:47 en 87h 57m 47s
1	PELLECUER Laurent	Cliptol Sport*
2	ELIES Yann	Groupe Generali Assurances	+16'6''
3	de PAVANT Kito	Groupe Bel	+21'45''
4	TABARLY Erwan	Thales	+26'19''
5	BEYOU Jérémie	Delta Dore	+26'20''
6	DUTHIL Frédéric	Brossard	+32'11''
7	CAUDRELIER Charles	Bostik	+34'34''
8	DESJOYEAUX Michel	Géant	+39'49''
9	D'ALI Pietro	Nanni Diesel	+42'52''
10	DAVIES Samantha	Skandia	+49'2''
11	PETIT Benoit	Défi Santé Voile	+49'24''
12	ATTANASIO Romain	MrBookmaker.com	+49'36''
13	BESTAVEN Yannick	Aquarelle.com	+1h2'17''
14	GREGOIRE Jeanne	Banque Populaire	+1h4'8''
15	TROUSSEL Nicolas	All Mer	+1h20'50''
16	MORVAN Gildas	Cercle Vert	+1h28'28''
17	EMIG Marc	Total	+1h37'39''
18	BERENGER Nicolas	KONE Ascenseurs	+1h46'47''
19	TRIPON Armel	Gedimat	+1h50'51''
20	VITTET Dominic	ATAO Audio System	+2h0'15''
21	CHABAGNY Thierry	Lèbre Bermudes	+2h0'24''
22	DROUGLAZET Eric	Crédit Maritime	+2h0'36''
23	WARDLEY Liz	Sojasun	+2h1'3''
24	LEPESQUEUX Marc	Maisons Pierre	+2h3'8''
25	VENIARD Gérald	Scutum	+2h4'59''
26	MOUREN Jean-Paul	M@rseillentreprises	+2h25'42''
27	SVILARICH Etienne	Sogeti	+2h30'54''
28	PEAN Lionel	L'Esprit d'Equipe	+2h51'51''
29	ROGNON Cyrille	ENO & Navi Line	+3h5'9''
30	RIECHERS Jorg	Germanytoo	+3h51'38''
31	LE CLEAC'H Armel	Foncia-TBS	+3h58'18''
32	KRAUSS Oliver	Espoir Crédit Agricole	+4h7'24''
33	LE GAL Franck	Lenze	+4h32'8''
34	SEVAUX Stéphane	Sarthe	+4h36'23''
35	AUDIGANE Sébastien	D'Aucy Cultive la vie	+4h43'12''
36	BIGOT Gaël	Team 117	+4h48'1''
37	CASO Jean Christophe	Groupe STEC / Charente Maritime	+5h20'57''
38	DEFERT Eric	Amiral de Bretagne - Suzuki	+6h0'36''
39	BOUVET Christophe	Bo Travail !	+6h12'13''
40	THETIOT Sébastien	Déclic Morbihan	+6h40'7''
41	BOUGARD Patrice	Kogane	+7h2'26''

Overall provisional elasped (after three legs, one leg to go)

Pos	Skipper	Boat	Total elapsed time
1	PELLECUER Laurent	Cliptol Sport	196h 53min 21s
2	D'ALI Pietro	Nanni Diesel	+9'39''
3	BEYOU Jérémie	Delta Dore	+10'32''
4	DUTHIL Frédéric	Brossard	+12'51''
5	TABARLY Erwan	Thales	+22'53''
6	de PAVANT Kito	Groupe Bel	+24'46''
7	CAUDRELIER Charles	Bostik	+26'34''
8	DESJOYEAUX Michel	Géant	+34'29''
9	ATTANASIO Romain	MrBookmaker.com	+51'54''
10	ELIES Yann	Groupe Generali Assurances	+53'26''
11	MORVAN Gildas	Cercle Vert	+57'51''
12	PETIT Benoit	Défi Santé Voile	+1h7'39''
13	CHABAGNY Thierry	Lèbre Bermudes	+1h49'40''
14	GREGOIRE Jeanne	Banque Populaire	+1h58'53''
15	BERENGER Nicolas	KONE Ascenseurs	+2h3'27''
16	VENIARD Gérald	Scutum	+2h7'9''
17	DAVIES Samantha	Skandia	+2h14'26''
18	VITTET Dominic	ATAO Audio System	+2h20'4''
19	DROUGLAZET Eric	Crédit Maritime	+2h20'57''
20	TROUSSEL Nicolas	All Mer	+3h0'59''
21	EMIG Marc	Total	+3h10'14''
22	WARDLEY Liz	Sojasun	+3h18'5''
23	BESTAVEN Yannick	Aquarelle.com	+3h43'50''
24	LE CLEAC'H Armel	Foncia-TBS	+3h48'18''
25	LEPESQUEUX Marc	Maisons Pierre	+4h3'30''
26	TRIPON Armel	Gedimat	+4h4'18''
27	ROGNON Cyrille	ENO & Navi Line	+4h12'22''
28	SVILARICH Etienne	Sogeti	+4h36'38''
29	MOUREN Jean-Paul	M@rseillentreprises	+5h2'44''
30	KRAUSS Oliver	Espoir Crédit Agricole	+5h6'25''
31	PEAN Lionel	L'Esprit d'Equipe	+6h8'52''
32	AUDIGANE Sébastien	D'Aucy Cultive la vie	+7h19'51''
33	LE GAL Franck	Lenze	+7h32'46''
34	SEVAUX Stéphane	Sarthe	+7h58'24''
35	BIGOT Gaël	Team 117	+8h20'45''
36	BOUVET Christophe	Bo Travail !	+8h42'45''
37	DEFERT Eric	Amiral de Bretagne - Suzuki	+9h43'55''
38	CASO Jean Christophe	Groupe STEC / Charente Maritime	+10h11'22''
39	RIECHERS Jorg	Germanytoo	+11h6'4''
40	BOUGARD Patrice	Kogane	+11h44'45''
41	THETIOT Sébastien	Déclic Morbihan	+11h48'48''