A busy weekend ahead for the Transat Paprec leaders

The leading group on the Transat Paprec have today passed offshore of the Straits of Gibraltar, the entrance to the Mediterranean, and are preparing their strategies for the approach to the turning mark off La Palma in the Canary Island where they turn west to cross the Atlantic to Saint Barth's.

Top duo Skipper MACIF (Loïs Berrehar/Charlotte Yven) had a little over 300 miles to sail to the virtual mark this Friday evening. The peloton should be there by Sunday but will have lighter airs and a more lifted, downwind breeze which will require some gybes to be made to get down to the Canaries.

Were they not all fighting so hard for small gains the routine might be considered boring, relentless steady reaching on starboard gybe. Ten miles separate the top seven mixed doubles now and Berrehar and Yven – who two weeks ago on the prologue exhibition race – are 1.8 miles ahead of second placed Mutuelle Bleu (Corentin Horeau/Pauline Courtois)
Indeed leader Berrehar said today the monotony of the regime was only "punctuated by the new weather files".
He explains some of their speed advantage, "We are quicker. We take turns at the helm or we are under pilot and fully trimming all the time."