BBC SPORT | Special Events | 2001 | MacArthur in the Mondial

She was there re-fitting her first real ocean-going boat - which she later sailed across the Atlantic to great acclaim.

Her first race on board Kingfisher was the prestigious Route Du Rhum from St Malo to Guadaloupe in 1999 - and more than a million people turned up to watch the start.

In many ways, the 24-year-old sums up the French marine industry: young, cool and vibrant.

She is also a gutsy female excelling in a male-dominated sport and, almost as importantly, has made the effort not just to learn French but become virtually fluent.

"When she speaks we understand what she says," says Philippe Jeantot, who organised the end-of-race reception at Les Sables D'Olonne.

Many more people turned out to greet Ellen in France than in England
"We can also understand the emotions which she talks about so well. Everyone in France has fallen under her charms."

MacArthur has been compared with some of the great French female sailors such as Florence Arthaud, who won the Route du Rhum in 1980, and Isobelle Autissier, famed for winning the first leg of the solo round-the-world race in 1994.

Round-the-world solo sailing began as a quintessentially British adventure.

Sir Francis Chichester became the first person to do it in 1967 and Robin Knox-Johnston and Chay Blyth soon made their marks on the history of long-distance sailing.

But it did not take the French long to dominate a field they have since taken very much to their hearts.

Alain Colas, Philippe Monnet, Olivier de Kersauson and Titouan Lamazou, who won the first Vendee Globe race in 1989, were the names to follow in the late 1970 and 1980s.

Ellen pops a cork on France's favourite drink
Mike Golding made headlines for Britain in 1994 when he set a new record for an east-to-west circumnavigation, in Team Group IV.

But it was skippers such as Christophe Auguin and Alain Gautier, who Ellen will crew for this summer aboard his trimaran Foncia, who hogged the limelight for France with their victories in the Vendee Globe.

MacArthur's decision to throw her hat in with the French trimaran circuit is understandable not just because of her affinity with the public but her need to earn a living.

The sponsorship side of the sport is far more highly developed in France, largely thanks to high-profile television coverage.

Gautier is a long-standing hero of Ellen's and she is also old friends with many of the skippers taking part in this season's trimaran series.

If the partnership succeeds, the French connection may yet lure Ellen away from Britain for good.