And another new leader

As Gaspe 7 pulls into pole on day 15 of the Transat AG2R La Mondiale

The big Transat AG2R La Mondiale gamble continues with the boats now fanned out over a now 700 mile wide race track. The few boats that remain in the north are doing the best on the leaderboard with Joseph Brault and Antoine Koch on Gaspe 7 pulling into first place overnight while some 125 miles to their north, former Open 60 skippers Yann Elies and Jeremie Beyou on Generali Europ Assistance are up to second. Interestingly this is with the Gaspe 7 having been unable to receive GRIB files as the Iridium phone (that all the boats carry) is not working.

What is intriguing is how these northerly boats seem to continue to make reasonable progress in a zone where there should be lighter winds, compared to the majority of the fleet which have dived off dramatically to the south, adding greatly to the number of miles they have to sail to the St Barts finish line, now less than 1,500 miles away. In fact in the north there has been wind, albeit more patchy and causing the crew to constant scramble around replacing kites with genoas and back again while in the south the Trades have been more consistent but lighter at around 12 knots.

While the northerly boats are in the limelight, the group to the south remains in major combat with last weeks lead foursome showing Armel Le Cleac'h and Fabien Delahaye on BritAir now 13 miles ahead of Romain Attanasio and Sam Davies on Saveol, with 50 miles scanning the course width between BritAir in the northwest and Banque Popuulaire in the southeast. Another 50 miles to this group's southeast is the most southerly group including bit hitters such as Nicolas Lunven and Jean le Cam on board Generali and Nicolas Troussel and Thomas Rouxel on Credit Mutuel de Bretagne.

As was the case yesterday, it is the four boats led by BritAir that continue to make the best progress in the fleet having averaged 8.3-8.6 knots over the last four hours, almost twice as fast as the leaders. Even Groupe Bel, which is the only boat in the fleet on the wind as she negotiates the south side of the depression centred several hundred miles to the north of the fleet, is faster than the leaders and is an interesting situation as over the course of the next 24 hours she will see the wind veering from the southwest into the northwest, allowing them to crack sheets and head for St Barts. 

So while the south (left) side of the race course is still looking to be the favoured over the next days, at present it is still the lotto.

Yann Eliès on Generali-Europ Assistance reported this morning " Our night was difficult, making progress in the rain alternating spinnaker/genoa. Gaspé 7 has been favoured in the south and goes straight. Then the boats in the south will come good and will very quickly return to the race and that will be difficult! So you struggle with what you have. Our order of the day is to keep making small gains, to exploit the shifts and to remain in the best corridor of wind."

See a more detailed version of the top image here courtesy of Expedition Navigation Systems and PredictWind.

Positions at 0748