Following strong turnout, Socialist candidate Francois Hollande has won the first round of France’s presidential vote, and on May 6th he will face Nicolas Sarkozy in the final run-off.

For months Hollande has led second-round polls by at least 10 percent over Sarkozy, a lead many call insurmountable.

Nearly one voter in five selected Marine Le Pen of the National Front, a slightly bigger score than predicted.

Nicolas Sarkozy has limped into the second round, but he’s long-maintained that all bets are off for the final round of voting. But he can’t run on his vastly unpopular record, and years of negative polls indicate that his right-wing vision of the future is just too far out of step with the average voter to win re-election.