First place for Troussel

On the first leg of the Solitaire du Figaro, has the 2006 winner delivered the blow that will earn him his second victory?

Nicolas Troussel, 2006 winner and skipper of Financo, has won the shortened first leg of the the Solitaire du Figaro. The 34 year old French skipper crossed the new finish line at Cape Ortegal at 15:50:46 after 73 hours, 32 minutes and 46 seconds of racing at an average speed of just 4.35 knots over the 320 mile shortened course.

On the leg from La Rochelle to Vigo, Troussel took the lead on 26 July at the 19sched and remained there until the end.

"I managed to get away from the fleet in the light air," Troussel explained upon finishing. "Then it was always going to be better toward the front of the fleet. I had a bit of breeze and was just able to make the most of it so made gains without doing anything particularly extraordinary, it just all happened naturally. There was a little group of us quite tightly bunched together: Christian Bos, Fred Duthil and myself. Progressively the leader made more gains on the second and so on. I think that I also did quite well in the light wind with my spinnaker, which is really good. It the end it comes down to very little, small details. I have a feeling that quite a few people got rest and slept and I remained pretty much alert the whole time…”

On finishing Troussel reported that he was exhausted from having had to change headsails so often over the course of the day. "I just can’t wait to be under engine and to deliver the boat to get some rest. I had 15-minute naps. Yesterday I must have had two or three quarter hour rests, today half an hour or so and the less on the first day."

Second place was taken by Christian Bos on Région Midi Pyrénées who managed to overtake Fred Duthil on the approach to the finish line. Bos who has previous never finished higher than 33rd overall in the Figaro finished 5 hours, 33 minutes and 44 seconds behind Troussel. Since the Solitaire du Figaro is scored on cumulative elapsed time and typically minutes and seconds, not hours separate the leaders, Troussel's impressive time on this leg could be the decisive point that wins him overall victory in the race for a second time.

Fred Duthil finished third 6 hours, 31 minutes and 34 seconds behind Troussel and the forecast is not looking great for the rest of the fleet with the wind dropping.

So does Troussel reckon he's got the Solitaire in the bag? “The gaps are big, particularly as I was able to reach the Westerly wind first. I must have covered 70 miles upwind whilst the others must have had 110 or 120. I also know that after two legs anything can happen. The last one is a mighty chunk of the race. We are also going to go through areas where anything can happened and gaps can be built. Even though I have done well today in Spain I do not consider that the race is won!"

Among the 'Bizuths' (the Figaro first timers/rookies) Francois Gabart on Espoir Région Bretagne was first, impressively in sixth place, followed by Mini sailor Adrien Hardy on AGIR Recouvrement with third place held by Britain's own Andy Greenwood on Imtech

Results leg 1:

Pos	Skipper	Boat
1	Troussel Nicolas	Financo	arrived on 28/07/08 at 15:50:46 in 73h31'46'
2	Bos Christian	Région Midi Pyrénées	+05h33'44'
3	Duthil Frédéric	Distinxion Automobile	+06h31'34'
4	Tabarly Erwan	Athema	+07h26'45'
5	Grégoire Jeanne	Banque Populaire	+07h31'31'
6	Gabart François	Espoir Région Bretagne	+07h43'49'
7	Hardy Adrien	AGIR Recouvrement	+07h48'09'
8	Pratt Christopher	DCNS 97	+07h49'19'
9	Bérenger Nicolas	KONE Ascenseurs	+07h51'00'
10	Morvan Gildas	Cercle Vert	+08h11'29'
11	Rouxel Thomas	Défi Mousquetaires	+08h44'56'
12	Mouren Jean-Paul	M@rseillEntreprises	+08h47'24'
13	Pellecuer Laurent	Docteur Valnet aromathérapie	+08h50'24'
14	Le Gal Franck	Lenze	+08h51'04'
15	Koch Antoine	Sopra Group 1	+09h05'20'
16	Drouglazet Eric	Luisina	+09h09'04'
17	Veniard Gérald	Macif	+09h09'24'
18	Rivet Frédéric	BUREAU-CENTER	+09h10'14'
19	Loison Alexis	ALLMER INEO GDF SUEZ	+09h12'00'
20	D'Ali Pietro	Mc Louis	+09h12'04'
21	Mahé Gildas	Le Comptoir Immobillier	+09h14'02'
22	Treussart Ronan	Groupe Celeos	+09h17'04'
23	Douguet Corentin	E.Leclerc Mobile	+09h21'19'
24	Attanasio Romain	DCNS 62	+09h22'09'
25	Chabagny Thierry	SUZUKI Automobiles	+09h32'34'
26	Tripon Armel	Gedimat	+09h51'07'
27	Gouezigoux Laurent	BOISTECH	+09h53'59'
28	Péron Eric	L'esprit d'équipe	+09h54'59'
29	Belloir Aymeric	CAP 56	+10h09'54'
30	Biarnes Vincent	Côtes d'Armor	+10h12'54'
31	Lepesqueux Marc	Les Conquérants de Normandie/Caen la Mer	+10h25'37'
32	Nagy Robert	THEOLIA	+10h28'19'
33	Da Cruz Antonio-Pedro	Baïko	+10h45'44'
34	Bouillard Didier	MEDevent	+10h48'26'
35	Le Miere Grégoire	OTCex Group	+10h55'15'
36	Lunven Nicolas	Foncia	+10h56'46'
37	Greenwood Andy	Imtech	+11h02'29'
38	D'Hooghe Eric	FMC Recyclage-Thompson Recyclage	+11h03'31'
39	Monnet Jean-Charles	Degrémont SUEZ ENVIRONNEMENT	+11h10'31'
40	Jossier Nicolas	Esprit Voile 50	+11h10'37'
41	Gendron Grégory	Sopra Group 2	+11h17'39'
42	Riou Elodie	KPMG	+11h21'19'
43	Wardley Liz	Sojasun	+11h32'14'
44	Joschke Isabelle	Synergie	+12h16'24'
45	Lebas Christophe	LOLA	+12h18'26'
46	Nicol Jean-Pierre	Gavottes	+14h29'34'
47	Bard Philippe	Morillon.fr	+18h22'06'