Kevin Escoffier aboard Jean Le Cam's boat after the rescue, December 1, 2020. -

PRB

There's a new sheriff in town.

After the setbacks of Charlie Dalin, forced to put the brakes to repair a damaged foil, Thomas Rettant took the lead of this Vendée Globe 2020, closely followed (very) closely by the Nazairien Yannick Bestaven.

But on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday, the latter ended up leaving it in its retro to take control of the race.

We take stock.

The classification at 9 a.m.

1. Yannick Bestaven (Maître Coq IV) 12,348 nautical miles from the finish

2. Thomas Rettant (LinkedOut) 5.9 nautical miles from the leader

3. Charlie Dalin (Apivia) 149.5 nautical miles from the leader

4. Jean Le Cam (Yes we Cam!) 442.9 nautical miles from the leader

5. Damien Seguin (APICIL Group) 454.2 nautical miles from the leader

Dalin repairs, Dalin leaves

Forced to pull over to the aisle to repair - in conjunction with his ground crew - the damage to the part that makes the junction between the port foil and the hull, Charlie Dalin was finally able to resume the race, not without leaving buckets of feathers there.

Leader since November 23, the native of Saint-Nazaire is now third in the VG 2020, nearly 150 nautical miles from the new leader Yannick Bestaven.

"We worked all night and in the morning with Charlie in order to be able to come up with a viable solution and try to resolve the problem observed," said Antoine Carraz, in charge of the technical direction of Apivia.

Charlie changed his trajectory in order to take advantage of favorable conditions to repair the low hold of the port foil and it went well.

The boat was thus able to resume its course around 1 p.m. (French time) and Charlie was able to go to rest.

The next few hours will be crucial to know if the repair has held.

Bestaven drops off Rettant

We followed him all day Tuesday and what was bound to happen happened.

By dint of scavenging nautical miles on the then leader, Thomas Rettant, Yannick Bestaven ended up overtaking his colleague and here he is leader by a short head at the time of writing.

But this lead could quickly widen since it is Wednesday that the Vendée Globe jury is supposed to communicate the compensation to the skippers who came to the aid of Kévin Escoffier at the start of the race, of which Bestaven is one.

The "King John" will jump in the rankings

In the game of compensations, if the skipper Maître Coq IV will benefit from some bonuses, it is above all Jean Le Cam who should be enjoying himself, he who for many hours put his race aside to help Kévin Escoffier .

From there to imagine the Quimpérois leading the race?

Our brain was too cloudy this morning to embark on very complex calculations that only the members of the jury mastered perfectly.

Wait and sea (do you have it?), Then.

[Day 37 # VG2020📹]


Battle in the Indian Ocean between @LouisBurtonOff, @sailingdamien, @borisherrmann, @JeanLecam and @BDutreux!

Edge to edge since they gybed at the corner of the Antarctic Exclusion Zone plateau, these five boats have been sailing in sight ... pic.twitter.com/JUwIZuxv7m

- Vendée Globe (@VendeeGlobe) December 15, 2020

Incredible five-way fight

Behind the leading trio, five boats (Le Cam, Seguin, Dutreux, Hermann, Burton) are fighting each other in a truly mind-blowing battle, where the cars are almost side to side in the middle of the Indian Ocean.

The world is small, is that what we say?

Sport

Vendée Globe 2020: The incredible image of five boats almost side to side on the borders of the Indian Ocean

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