Charlie Dalin doubles his lead over his first pursuer… Follow the position of the boats live

The skipper of Macif consolidates his first provisional position day after day. On Friday, he even doubled his lead over his runner-up, Sébastien Simon, in 24 hours.

At the front of a storm, pushed by gusts of 80 km/h, Charlie Dalin (Macif) continues to widen the gap at the head of the Vendée Globe, with almost 200 nautical miles over Sébastien Simon (Groupe Dubreuil) at the 7 a.m. check-in, Friday, December 6. The two skippers are heading due east towards Australia and Cape Leeuwin.

After leaving the Kerguelen Islands (archipelago in the French Southern and Antarctic Lands) behind him, Charlie Dalin sails to the limit of the Antarctic Exclusion Zone and the Howling 50s, dealing with a vast low pressure system and waves approaching five meters .

Sébastien Simon, long clinging to the leader, has continued to lose time in recent days. Passed to the other side of the low pressure system, behind its center, it no longer benefits from the same conditions as Charlie Dalin. “I’m trying to be careful with the boat which still pushed me to slow down a little, admitted Sébastien Simon. I was a little bit eaten by the eye of depression which blocked me for almost two hours, it was very surprising, I had never had that experience. The wind has started to return with the back of the depression, I am starting to have quite strong seas, quite cross, and above all a very cold, very dense and very gusty wind.

Behind this duo, the gap is made with Yoann Richomme (Paprec Arkéa), who is more than 500 minutes away and leads a group having opted for a much more northern route, around 40 degrees latitude. Besides Richomme, this group of competitors, made up of Thomas Ruyant (Vulnerable), Jérémie Beyou (Charal) and Nicolas Lunven (Holcim-PRB), is on a southeast trajectory which will bring it closer to the same vast low pressure system as the two skippers. head.