Panther's progress

madforsailing talks to an unusually sheepish Rob Greenhalgh about the Tour Voile

Region Ile de France has been particularly quick offshore. "I don't know how they've been so flash. They had Isabelle Autissier doing the navigation. She knows her way around that coastline better than anyone else in the world I would imagine. They pulled out some awesome results which I was a bit surprised by..." But the boats that are leading are those who have been consistently good on the inshore races as well - Nantes St Nazaire and the Swiss on Ville Geneve - Carrefour Prevention.

So what would he do differently next time? "Not a lot. We'd sail slightly differently probably. We weren't ill-prepared by any means. We've got the right people. But we haven't carried it out in the best way. We made some big blunders early on. We should have had a slightly stronger squad to start with possibly, but it's no drama...."

Recent additions to the team have included 49er silver medallist Ian Barker, who stepped on board in La Rochelle to beef up the tactical know-how and the most recent addition is Farr 40 owner/driver Mark Heeley. Navigator/weather man Mike Broughton has been with the team constantly and sails the offshore races. Considering the amount of racing in the Tour Voile the weather and navigation role is unquestionably a full-time job. "We had too many people to start with as well," Greenhalgh says. "So we've cut down the squad a little bit. We're nine of us at the moment - seven on the boat and two on the shore - and we rotate around a bit. So we're not over the top now."

While the racing is intense, the shore side job of racing around after the boats is also a far from easy job. "Also you learn about the shore set-up, the hotels, getting people down the boat and general getting organised. That is a fairly serious logistical nightmare in itself, simply moving the camp around France."

So is he enjoying it? "It's an awesome event. It's the best event you could ever do. It's just a lot of very good sailors. It's an absolute tight one design - everyone has very similar speeds, the whole thing about moving around the coast to lots of different ports, always on the move - it's great. It's just awesome. It's very well run. There's lots of spectator attention. It is pretty amazing really just to see the whole set-up. They've got this whole village which moves round, it is the size of a Cowes Week village, and it is just amazing how it all works."

Today at 0600 the boats depart Sete on an 'offshore' leg to Marseilles. "Then we've got a Mistral due on Wednesday-Thursday. So we've got two races in Marseilles which will be windy. Then offshore Thursday to Hyeres. We'll probably have two races in Hyeres as well on Friday, then on Saturday a race to Nice. We race there Sunday-Monday and that's the finish." But for Greenhalgh and his team they will have their work cut out for them if they want to make the top five.