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Quote / unquote : Soldini / Nouel / Seguin / Hardy

Giovanni Soldini - IT (Telecom Italia) : « This is fun ! What an incredible match with Stamm and Jourdren. We know each other well and are used to sailing side by side. We’ve come across each other a lot this year on different races. When we’re on the wrong tack, they are better off and move ahead, but it can equally well be the other way round. They are fast in light air. We’re better in a blow !! We repaired our stay with a length of line before the Saint Barts gate. It should hold. Yesterday we went off south which was costly to start out with, but which meant that we would be well placed west. Our wind ought to be better than for Bruno and Bernard. We hope we don’t find ourselves in the wind hole where Tanguy is. This has been a long race so we are looking forward to the finish. I reckon we’ll be into Progreso around the 14th. Sunrise, the wind is leaving us and there’s a cargo vessel astern. Down with the spinnaker. Ciao ! »

Frédéric Nouel – FR (Plan, les enfants changeront le monde) : « We’re ok apart from a spot of bother with the wind as we approach Saint Barts. We’ve covered just one mile in eight hours. It’s wearing mentally and physically. We wound up in place where the wind is conspicuous by its absence. But we’ve got no choice as Saint Barts is a compulsory passage point. 100 miles, 12 hours just 20 minutes ago and now 20 a reset to 20 hours! We’re going to put into port to repair the genoa jib and we are also short on fuel. It doesn’t worry us to stop for three hours. It’ll be nice to eat some fresh fruit! Denis and I have sailed a lot together and had promised that we would do a transatlantic one day. A race was better still! It’s been brilliant from a sailing and personal point of view. »

Damien Seguin – FR (Cargill-MTTM) : « Flat out over the last 24 hours. Great conditions, so we’ve been able to clock up some good average speeds. The boat is 100%. We have new-found energy after our pitstop even though it meant losing a great deal of ground. The sun is rising on the coast of Haiti and we’re about to enter into a complex weather system as we pass Jamaica. We’re going to have to adopt a more opportunist approach in this tropical system.»

Adrien Hardy – FR (Initiatives-Novedia) : « All’s fine on board. The wind is back and so we’re getting wetter. We’ve got the medium spinnaker up and have 10-12 knots or so. As expected. We trust the weather information. Being correctly positioned is going to be extremely important in the next stage as things are going to slow down. We’ve got a pretty good idea of what’s in store up to the finish. Two days from now, there’s a calm zone in the Gulf of Mexico which is going have to be crossed as quickly as possible. And we won’t be far from Cuba and so we’ll have to be careful of coastal phenomena. Don’t want to put a foot wrong so close to the finish. »