Having finished the Tour de Bretagne, the longest leg of the Tour de France à la Voile 2009, which meant a deserved victory for Courrier Dunkerque, the crews are now enjoying a day off at La Trinité sur Mer.
Therefore, all the crews were to meet at noon for a special briefing organized by the race comity.
For William Borel, the purpose of this briefing was to remind everyone of the security rules and to make sure for the sailors to respect it. The race director focused his speech on the obligation of being on the watch by every means included the VHF.
As a matter of fact, it is after the fortuitous release of an emergency ASN call from the Elcimaï - Ville de Marseille boat that the race comity could notice that all the crews were not subscribing to this alert obligation. The jury decided to apply a system of penalties for the crews breaking this rule.
On the contrary, the students from Normale Sup Lagardère are to receive extra points for their impressive behaviour aboard. The student crew was really helpful when looking for the Elcimaï boat during the night and under difficult weather conditions. For information, Elcimaï's VHF sent a random emergency message but everything was ok on board of Elcimaï - Ville de Marseille.
"The whole point of this briefing was to remind the crews they are sailors before racers" sums up William Borel.
Except this mandatory briefing, the crews were absolutely free today. The reason for a day off was above all to give some rest to the crews. They were indeed tired after a 215 miles long offshore race, held under rather heavy weather. Naps, visits to the physical therapists, internal meetings, movie sessions or preparation sessions for tomorrow's race were scheduled. The crew from Nouvelle Calédonie could even meet their sponsor, the soccer player Antoine Kombouaré and the whole PSG soccer team in training session at Le Crouesty.
The technical support staff, sometimes helped by members of the crew, was busy looking for damages on the boats equipment as the offshore leg was particularly rough. "Today will be dedicated to the boat repairs, as there were quite serious damages. The spinnaker is torn out, we broke a stick and pulleys and the sheets are damaged. We also have to dry out the boat." tells us Solen Plan Rouzaud, an INSA Sopra crew.
The winning crew of Courrier Dunkerque does not have to face that much of damage but a serious check out is still necessary. "Today, we made a general check to make sure that everything will be alright for tomorrow's race. There is no breakage but we prefer to check as we're back from a long leg. We just want to take no risk, prevention is better than cure." tells us Daniel Souben.
The equipment and the crew members should be at their top level for tomorrow 10.00 am, when the first triangle race is scheduled to begin. Others should follow, depending on the weather.
On the evening at 8.00 pm, the fleet will leave La Trinité sur Mer for the 5th offshore leg heading to Talmont-Saint-Hilaire in Vendée. A West North Western 3 to 5 knots wind is forecast.

William Borel assessment:
Courrier Dunkerque is leading but there is still space for an unexpected twist. The game is still on. Direct opponents can still jeopardize their first place but they took an obvious psychological advantage.
They managed this long leg with a lot of maturity and good judgement; they prove everyone that they were to be counted on at the breakpoint moments, and the same for CSC - HEC - Ecole Navale. The amateur ranking is the more likely to change with three boats neck and neck. The favourites took the first places on the student ranking.
However, there is still a lot of points to be given, we held 11 races over a potential of 40. The first quarter only is over, but it is an important one."

About the organisation:
"Concerning the organisation, we went through the hardest part as we are done with the two most difficult stages. There were two important stages from a sportive point of view but also from a management point of view. Everything would be fine now - I mean there won't be any "slow down" as we will go through the Atlantic stages anyway and we reckon that the weather should not be a major snag."

Interview of Daniel Souben, skipper of Courrier Dunkerque, leader of the overall ranking:
"Today we made a general check to make sure that everything will be alright for tomorrow's race. There is no breakage but we prefer to check as we're back from a long leg. We want to be ready as tomorrow triangle races and the offshore leg will be held. We worked on tomorrow's navigation and we also plan to recover thanks to a lot of rest, proper meals and some physical therapist sessions. We wanna be ready tomorrow!"

Interview of Solen Plan-Rouzaud, crew of INSA Sopra, 18th of the overall ranking:
"Today will be dedicated to the boat repairs, as there were quite serious damages. The spinnaker is torn out, we broken a stick and pulleys and the sheets are damaged. We also have to dry out the boat. The crews helped to restore the boat so we all had some rest this morning. We gonna go to bed early tonight to be fit and well for tomorrow."

Interview of Laurent Guillemette, crew of Elcimaï - Ville de Marseille:
"We made some repairs on the boat this morning. I plan to swim a little bit this afternoon. We had some issues with our VHF which is really noisy, so we gonna change it and set up an external loudspeaker. The crew members can do whatever they want this afternoon, it's up to them but we all had lunch together."

Interview of Arthur Le Vailant, crew of Centrale - Mécénat Chirurgie Cardiaque, 23rd of the overall ranking:
"Today's schedule? A lot of repairs. We have winches to grease, the boat must be fully cleaned, the wind was blowing hard and we have been soaked ! We need to repair some small damages to be ready for tomorrow's races and the offshore leg. It's not a big deal but we have to check the halyards, the ropes, etc. Everyone is helping to make it work.
We are not professionals, we don't have physical therapists nor osteopaths so no sessions today even if it would have been great!"
 

Agathe Armand / Laura Ruaudel / Effets Mer