Will the north or the south pay?

Armel Tripon continues to lead, but Bertrand de Broc now seems to be ahead to the south in Trophee BPE solo Figaro race

Positions at 1000 GMT

Pos	Boat Skipper	Latitude	Longitude	Spd	Crs	DTF	DTL
1	Gédimat Armel Tripon	42 21.81' N	21 18.52' W	7.2	222	2601	0
2	Suzuki Automobiles Eric Defert	42 38.26' N	21 28.45' W	7.7	248	2601.2	0.1
3	A.ST Groupe Marc Emig	34 36.41' N	17 02.60' W	6.2	219	2631.8	30.7
4	Cercle Vert Gildas Morvan	34 36.08' N	17 01.30' W	6.2	199	2633.8	32.8
5	Aquarelle.com Yannick Bestaven	34 14.37' N	16 48.04' W	7.1	232	2638.2	37.2
6	Les Mousquetaires Bertrand de Broc	34 02.43' N	16 40.74' W	6.7	245	2642	41
7	Luisina Eric Drouglazet	34 06.82' N	16 41.71' W	6.1	219	2642.4	41.4
8	Theolia Robert Nagy	38 11.59' N	18 05.78' W	7.1	206	2643.2	42.2
9	Groupe Céléos Ronan Treussart	34 24.41' N	16 30.82' W	7	225	2654.6	53.6
10	Bostik Charles Caudrelier	33 46.02' N	16 19.68' W	8.3	242	2655.7	54.7
11	Défi Mousquetaires Thomas Rouxel	33 53.71' N	16 21.54' W	6.2	217	2655.8	54.8
12	Financo Nicolas Troussel	34 01.02' N	16 21.26' W	6.8	204	2657.6	56.6
13	Sojasun Liz Wardley	33 47.73' N	16 14.85' W	6.7	199	2659.7	58.7
14	Le Comptoir Immobilier Gildas Mahé	34 49.79' N	16 31.45' W	8.2	230	2660	59
15	Baïko Antonio Pedro da Cruz	36 50.36' N	16 52.12' W	5.4	207	2674.9	73.9
16	Défi Transat 1 Yannig Livory	36 23.54' N	16 35.98' W	5.6	189	2680.4	79.4
17	Art Immobilier Construction Daniel Dupont	41 33.78' N	18 52.33' W	6.3	203	2680.6	79.6
18	Banque Populaire Jeanne Grégoire	34 01.89' N	15 49.39' W	7.4	229	2683.8	82.8
19	Lenze Franck Le Gal	35 27.84' N	15 46.72' W	7	216	2705.3	104.3
20	Iles de la région Guadeloupe Philippe Quéré	42 03.00' N	18 23.86' W	6.8	204	2711.3	110.3
21	Belle-Ile-en-Mer Christian Bos	34 08.45' N	15 07.43' W	6.7	167	2719.2	118.1
22	Pays Marie-Galante Victor Jean Noël	35 08.26' N	13 32.53' W	7.2	220	2807.4	206.3
23	France Soir Eric Peron	38 05.75' N	11 36.08' W	8.5	198	2934.7	333.7
24	Docteur Valnet - Aromathérapie Laurent Pellecuer	37 03.07' N	8 43.47' W	7.1	73	3059.9	458.9
25	GFI Group James Bird	41 11.15' N	8 42.29' W	0.1	267	3109.9	508.9
ABD	Brossard Servane Escoffier	Abandon
NL	Domaine du Mont d’Arbois T Duprey du Vorsent	Non localisé

With the Azores high drifting slowly southeast so the Trophee BPE has turned into three separate races. The group leading in the results above are those who have chosen to stick to the great circle. Here Armel Tripon and Eric Defert are locked in close combat.

The forecast does not bode well for them. At present it has them sailing upwind into a westerly breeze of around 15 knots associated with a secondary area of high pressure is forming to their northwest but the wind looks set to disappear for them tonight before it fills in again from the south or southeast. Beyond this there is a very strong band of gale force southerly or southeasterly winds they must contend with on Sunday-Monday time. Still this forecast is looking considerably better than it was earlier in the week when the only thing that looked to be in store for the boats taking this route was endless southwesterly headwinds.

“One would think oneself to be off Pointe Penmarc'h," joked Gedimat skipper Armel Tripon this morning. "From the conditions and the drizzle it could be Brittany. I still believe firmly in my northern choce , but from the weather it is still too early to be sure. It is necessary to await four or five days to know if I made a good choice. For the moment I keep going and I will rest as soon as possible. It is essential to remain lucid."

Eric Defert sailing Suzuki also reckons he made the right choice. "I am content, but there is still a long way to go. If all is well, after the Azores, we should cross in front of the southerners, reaching. But let's be careful - it is only the beginning of the race."

While just four boats remain in the north (in fact Daniel Dumont and Philippe Quere behind Tripon and Defert, have both headed south), the bulk of the fleet remain on the southerly option picking their way around the south side of the high pressure.

60 miles now lies across the race track between Marc Emig's A.ST Groupe and Gildas Morvan's Cercle Vert in the northwest, closest to the centre of the high and Charles Caudrelier's Bostik and Liz Wardley's Sojasun furthest to the southeast. In theory the boats furthest from the centre of the high should have slightly better pressure. From the looks of it former Vendee Globe skipper Bertrand de Broc on Les Mousquetaires may have taken over the lead now from Eric Drouglazet, with Caudrelier also looking good to the southeast.

"Last night, I was making up for the two previous nights," commented Marc Emig. "I lay down at 21h35, and was awoken by the telephone. Then I awoke every two hours to check the boat. The wind angle is ideal, 120° and 15 knots and a reasonable sea. Under these conditions, there is no reason to hesitate to delegate. The autopilot steers better than me, and especially after the last two days it was much needed."

Emig's next door neighbour at the northwestern extremity of the 'southerners', Gildas Morvan on Cercle Vert, is playing with the high. “The high does not stop behaving like a yoyo," he analyses. "It blows from the south, blows from the east, it does not stop changing. I spent the night trying to keep on top of it and keep going. It is much more pleasant than these last two days, but all the time it is necessary to keep trimming everything while permanently keeping an eye on the barometer…"

Morvan reckons their efforts will pay off. He says the trade winds are set up albeit more than 300 miles south on the level as the Canary Islands.

Meanwhile in between the two main groups are a few strays who are about to get completely scuppered by the high pressure including Robert Nagy on Théolia and Gitana XIII trimaran skipper Thierry Duprey on Domaine du Mont d’Arbois. "I have just 8 knots of wind from the southwest," Nagy said this morning. "It starts again and I get up to 6.5 knots. I steered all the night, under a clear sky, in the middle of dolphins - it was splendid. The hardest has passed - I think that the zone of calms is now behind me."

This morning Liz Wardley reports from on board Sojasun: "Day 6, water temp 17 degrees so getting better, air temp better too, still managing some bare footing during the days. I have gybed this mornng to get some south in while I had a wind shift and now the sun has come up I can see I am just about to pass not far behind Bostik so that's cool! I slept a LOT last night - I found a good tuning for the pilot and just let it go, waking up every 40 muinutes to check the wind direction and barometer. This high pressure is keeping my senses awake!!! I would really HATE to get stuck in it. I just spoke to Bostik on the VHF, funny to cross someone so close after six days of racing. It was good to chat, he wanted to know if I was heading to the Canaries - there is more wind down there at the moment but I don't think I'll take that option this year!

So I will open up the sail loft this morning and fix my spinaker so I have a reserve. should take 3 or 4 hours so not too bad. So I best get off the computer and back to work."

Meanwhile James Bird on GFI Group has come acropper. This morning he sent us this email: "I had to pull into Porto Leixoes, Portugal to replace my broken halyards. Its a problem I discovered on the first morning - the kite halyard had severely chafed so I had to mouse it out and repair it. Then off Cape Finisterre it went again, this time jamming at the top of the mast still attached to the spinnaker. I had to climb up to unclip the spinnaker pronto as the breeze shifted, forcing me to play chicken with the cargo ships. I climbed up again a few hours later to retreive the halyard. Once I got up (it takes a while on your own) I looked to see another ship coming at us. Luckily I had my pilot remote around my neck so used it to steer the boat from 20m up!!

"The halyards went again on wednesday morning, so I'd now run out of spare halyards and in 30 knots I wasn't going up the rig.

"The stop is quite gutting, especially as I look at the scheds to see everyone speeding towards Marie Malante. Knowing that Eric Peron also had to stop further down the coast but a full night's sleep, chips, steak and beer make it easier to handle, and the knowledge that once I restart I can rest easy knowing the problem is cured. My sister is bringing out the old halyards from the UK from when Sam had the boat...for some unknown reason these ones don't chafe. I hope to restart Friday eve and catch the tailenders......a two day deficit over 3000 miles is realistic. Hopefully now I'll be able to hold spinnakers and headsails for longer than six hours without having to drop them to repair the halyard!"