Every Saturday during the Vendée Globe, Charlie Dalin keeps a logbook for Europe 1. On his Apivia monohull, the 36-year-old skipper talks about his impressions, his strategy and the future events that await him in this legendary single-handed race. , nonstop and unassisted.

Last straight line for Vendée Globe sailors.

Five days from the finish, Charlie Dalin is in the top three with his competitors Louis Burton and Boris Herrmann.

The finish promises to be tight for the 36-year-old skipper who wants to "print a good pace" despite the fatigue of a round the world trip.

In their sights: Les Sables d'Olonne, where his family and his teams await the sailor.

On Europe 1, Charlie Dalin confides in a last weekly logbook, recorded on Friday.

The Azores high pressure behind

"We are really on the home stretch. We have just cleared one of the last obstacles before the finish, this Azores high, even though I am still sailing under the influence of its ridge. I am starting to be under pressure. influence of winds and depressions in the North Atlantic There are only a few days of navigation left.

Even if the distance is long, we are approaching the goal.

Soon, I would be at the height of the Azores in longitude, not long afterwards I would be at their height in latitude.

An increase in intensity 

There are a lot of people around, people on the left and people behind.

I think everyone is tired but wants to win.

We are all gradually changing our sailing style and moving to a slightly more attacking, a little more incisive navigation than in recent months.

I still have 3 days left on starboard and two days on port, roughly, so it's going to be three days on the wrong foil.

It would have been faster with it, but it's part of my habit now.

I have to navigate differently, adjust the sails differently.

It's part of my normalcy.

What will be the hardest thing is to regain a regatta rhythm but with the fatigue of going around the world, whether for me or for the boat.

Everyone will increase in intensity.

We will have to follow and hold on to the shock.

Succeed in printing a good pace, despite all this fatigue.

A tight end 

We are going to find some play. We went up the Atlantic, there was this East-West positioning, and once the choices were made, everyone followed their option.

While there, we will have fronts to negotiate, wind shifts to manage.

The game will reopen until the finish.

In a final phase, you never know how it's going to turn out: if we will arrive together, if there will be thousands of miles between the boats.

We don't know what time we're going to have, we don't know what will happen to us in technical tinkering.

I had prepared for a round the world regatta, but I didn't know when it was going to be the most intense.

There have been all along overall.

There has never been a huge gap between the boats.

We may be on the peak of the intensity of the race in recent days. 

Arrival as a goal 

I project myself on the finish of course.

It's a way to stay on the attack, to stay motivated, to think positive thoughts.

And I can't wait to find my son and my partner.

It's been three months since I left them.

I can't wait to get him on the boat. 

© Charlie Dalin

Hope all of this will be okay by then.

I touch wood, I cross my fingers to complete this tour of the world.

I have always said that it would be a success to finish the Vendée Globe already.

A world tour in 2020 is not trivial.

We have all proved this over the weeks of racing, through events, storms and damage.

Emotions but also competition 

I come back changed, I come back transformed in a way, after having experienced so many things, so many emotions.

Saturday, January 23, I am going to cross-check my outward path.

It's a bit symbolic, coming full circle, but what really matters is crossing that finish line.

To see Les Sables-d'Olonne, to see all my family, my relatives, it will be extremely moving as a moment.

Also see the whole team, my partners.

All the people who have been involved for months, years for this race, for this Vendée Globe.

And then there is the competition.

I hope that I will arrive well placed, in any case I do my best to.

An arrival in a complicated period in France

Of course, I'll be weakened and maybe more able to catch whatever is lying around.

My immune system was used little or nothing during these three months.

I was a bit in a health bubble, as strict as possible.

It's hard to do more!

I thought about it, saying to myself: 'You're coming in a little weak, aren't you more exposed to the coronavirus than usual?'

But I think I'll be careful.

And everything will be fine. "

Thanks Charlie!

A big thank you to Charlie Dalin for sharing with us this epic at the forefront of the Vendée Globe, which was not obvious at the start. Always faithful to the meeting on Saturday with the listeners of Europe 1 and the readers of Europe1.fr, he made us live this extraordinary world tour when the exercise was not so simple. We thank him, once again, just like Marie-Astrid Parendeau, his press officer, who was an essential link between Charlie and our editorial staff. See you now in Les Sables d'Olonne!