Two Brits still fighting to make Vendee start line

11:34 PM Thu 6 Nov 2008 GMT

'Vendee Globe Village' Vincent Curutchet / DPPI / Vend?e Globe &copy

With three days left before the start of the Vend?e Globe the atmosphere gets ever more electric as the crowds swell in Les Sables d'Olonne and the skippers continue their mix of media, preparation, and weather and routing strategy for the first few days.

While the weather around the race village remains pleasingly warm for the visitors, for the skippers there is the growing knowledge that they will be heading straight into muscular breezes from the start. Winds gusting to 40 knots, averaging 20-25 knots with 2-3 metre swell are expected with a
confused sea around the start line.

For the two British skippers who have been fighting their own different battles to make the start line, the news remains mixed.

Alex Thomson and his Hugo Boss shore team have had to contend with a chafe problem with their main halyard. In search of a solution Alex and his team set up a regime of hoisting and lowering the halyard over a 12 hours period through Wednesday night.

The ten person team worked hour shifts on and off the grinders making about 1800 cycles between 2100hrs Wednesday and 0700hrs Thursday:
An alloy chafe plate within the Hugo Boss mast had corroded from the time the mast spent on the sea bed,following the fishing boat collision on October 17th. This corrosion was causing chafeing to the main halyard inside the mast. The difficulty for the team was they were unable to see the problem inside the mast. They used halyards covered in hard covers, which were wound up and down under load with the aim to polish the chafe plates, effectively smoothing the ragged chafe plates. The team consider the process to be equivalent to half of the wear and tear the halyard would experience during the 26,000 miles around the world.

'Until the incident with the fishing vessel, I felt as prepared as I have ever been for a race. I felt physically strong, mentally ready and after completing the Barcelona World Race in second position and breaking the world distance record - I felt I had a strong chance of becoming the first British skipper to win the Vend?e. Since the accident - all I have been able to think and focus on is getting Hugo Boss repaired in time for the Vend?e start' said Alex Thomson.

British skippers - Vendee Globe - Mark Lloyd- DDPI-VendeeGlobe &copy

Meanwhile Steve White trails in the preparation stakes in a programme which he has regularly dubbed 'The eleven and a half-th hour'.Outwardly his boat looks nearly ready to go, but the inside appearance requires some considerable tidying and finishing.

'I am sure that we will be working until the last minute, that is just the way it is, but we are making progress all the time. The big step for us today was going sailing for the first time with the new sails. At first the rig had a little bend in it but we got that sorted out and I am really pleased with the sails. The most noticeable thing with the new main is that it just showed up how ultimately shocking the old one was. Immediately we were making between half a knot and three quarters of a knot more upwind
than before.'

The job list is definitely getting shorter. There is still an awful lot of work to do but I'll get there. The generator has still to be plumbed in, we have had a problem with the Sat C which is resolved, and a leak with the ballast valves which is being fixed as I speak.'

Ellen MacArthur, second in 2000-1, returned to Les Sables d'Olonne to enjoy the experience and lend her support to Seb Josse on BT, the IMOCA Open 60 which is owned and campaigned by Offshore Challenges, the company she owns with Mark Turner: 'It is great to be here, wonderful to see such a fantastic fleet. The fleet has grown of course and it will be very exciting not just to be here for the start, to see the boats leave but also to follow the race. I was here for the 2004 race, but I have not even been on the pontoons yet and so for me it just feels a little bigger. And believe me, just as soon as it is quiet I'll be down on to the pontoons to have a good look at the boats.'

For the Austrian Norbert Sedlacek all that remains is to load on his stores:'I am ready for anything. I am waiting for Sunday. It looks like the weather will be a little unstable, not so nice as four years ago and not so bad as eight years ago. I am really fine this time. And then quite a fine line around Cape Finisterre and then light winds maybe Monday, Tuesday before hopefully picking up a little north easterly.'

www.vendeeglobe.org/en/

by V?ronique Teurlay