Having briefly flown in to London last Thursday for the opening day of the London Boat Show, Ellen MacArthur hot-footed it back to France that evening to begin sailing trails aboard Kingfisher2.

MacArthur and her 13-strong crew have spent the last three days sailing the 110-foot catamaran off Lorient in preparation for their forthcoming Jules Verne attempt. MacArthur commented from the boat this morning: “With storms filing across the Atlantic, finding the right balance between not breaking the boat, but testing her properly before we set off around the world, is quite hard!

“On this trip though we’ve been making great progress, done loads of manoeuvres, sorted out a lot of stuff. There are so many systems on a raceboat like this to prove, optimise, and make reliable for a 60 day adventure around the globe.”

Putting the boat through the paces over the last few days has really allowed the crew to familiarise themselves with the systems and gain the confidence they need to work as a team on such a big cat. But it’s been all plain sailing with most of the crew suffering from a bout of flu. The ‘ship’s’ doctor, Dr Mark Tomson is currently carrying out medical checks and the entire crew will be having their final dental checks during the next week, ready for departure.