Bombing along!

Midway between the Canaries and Cape Verde, Prysmian Group is continuing its stampede in the trade winds, powered up making an average speed of 20 knots. As such, it’s over to piloting mode for the duo of Giancarlo Pedote – Anthony Marchand, who have no options to play for now other than gaining southing as quickly as possible, though the grey matter must already be whirring to work out the best way to tackle the Doldrums. The front runners should make their entry into this famous inter-tropical convergence zone from early Tuesday night to Wednesday. Meantime, the Italo-French duo are set to reach it around 24 hours later. In the meantime, they can savour a lovely session of slipping along under spinnaker, even if the NE’ly breeze currently propelling them along is relatively unstable, calling for them to trim the boat on a regular basis. So what of the rankings? This Monday, Jérémie Beyou and Christopher Pratt are still at the head of the fleet in this 14th Transat Jacques Vabre Normandie Le Havre whilst Giancarlo and Anthony are lying in 14th place, battling it out with Boris Herrmann and Will Harris, who were just 5.8 miles ahead of them at the last position report. It’ll certainly be a welcome competitive boost for those who opted for the West and are lamenting the keel damage suffered by Hugo Boss, which was making headway in the same group and has unfortunately been forced to retire from the race.