One horse race

In the Barcelona World Race, Virbac Paprec 3 now hold a 543 mile lead over second placed Mapfre

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Positions at 0830 GMT

Foncia's mast breakage and the announcement of her retirement this morning are a severe blow to the Barcelona World Race, which is now, only a quarter of the way in, a one horse race to a degree that we cannot remember ever having seen before in a round the world race. The gap between race leaders Virbac Paprec 3, sailed immaculately by Jean-Pierre Dick and Loick Peyron, now hold an advantage of 543 miles over Iker Martinez and Xabi Fernandez' second placed Mapfre , who in turn are 180 miles ahead of their nearest competition. 

One imagines that with Foncia out of the race, the crew of Virbac Paprec 3 will be easing off the accelerator, focussing more on keeping their boat in one piece for the 18,300 miles left to get them back to Barcelona World.

Virbac Paprec 3 rounded the eastern end of the Atlantic waypoint gate at around 1600 yesterday afternoon and has since dived back south where there is more breeze. Their current position is some 570 miles southwest of Cape Town and they are during to cross into the Indian Ocean tomorrow. With the front having passed, Virbac Paprec 3 is now into the strong southwesterly breeze behind it and tonight she will see the wind veering into the northwest as she drops back on to the depression the boats behind her are currently riding. 

Meanwhile third placed Mapfre is just approaching the western end of the Atlantic Gate on a course to the north of the boats behind her which have dug south in order to avoid being captured by the annoying zone of high pressure that is once again encroaching south. Unfortunately they do appear to have been nailed as while Alex Pella and Pepe Ribes had managed to coax 17.5 knots out of Estrella Damm in the hour leading up to the first sched this morning, the latest figures from the boat show this much reduced to 6.7.