Koch into the lead

As Solitaire du Figaro's first leg nears its conclusion

This evening the Solitaire du Figaro sailors had passed Land's End and the Scilly Isles and were heading out across the Irish Sea in about 15 knots of northwesterly breeze. At 1900 the 23 year old nipper of the race Antoine Koch held a slender lead over second placed Figaro veteran Gildas Morvan and had just under 60 miles left to go to get to Crosshaven. The front runners are expected to finish in the early hours of the morning.

Whether it is significant or not remains to be seen but Koch and third placed Christophe de Pavant are to the west of the rest of the boats. With less than 5 miles separating the top 12 boats it is fair to say the finish order is far from clear and already in the last 24 hours the lead has passed in turn from de Pavant to Eric Drouglazet to Charles Caudrelier before Koch took over.

While the strategy of the last remaining hours of the race alongside how hard each of the singlehanded skippers can push will be significant, an equally great issue will be fatigue. The 38 boats left northern France on Sunday lunch time and their skippers will have had next to no sleep for the last four days having had to deal with the light weather of the early stage of this leg and then having to negotiate the complex tidal gates sailing along the south coast of the UK. In theory skippers are supposed to catnap for periods of around 15 minutes at a time, but how many actually do this is debatable. It is at this stage of tiredness that skippers can start experiencing hallucinations and other experiences that the rest of us usually only experience in nightclubs having forked out hard earned cash.

In the Figaro class a lot is made of the 'bizuths' - the rookies or first timers. This is significant as the top 'bizuth' has in past years stood to win sponsorship and a boat for the year. Irishman and Tyco crewman Damian Foxall won this prize during the late 90s. At present in the Solitaire du Figaro this looks like being a toss up between Arnaud Boissières and Gwenaël Riou lying 22nd and 23rd respectively.

Positions at 1900