QUIMPER, France — At a little after 6 a.m. the other morning, Emmanuel Macron had already inspected case after case of brill, gurnard, sea bass, monkfish and turbot for sale at the market in the seaport of Le Guilvinec. The French presidential candidate had picked up the langoustine, shaken hands with fishermen and ship owners, asked pointed questions about their trade and promised he would look into their problems.

Then along came Brexit.

At a roundtable his staff had organized on the second day of a campaign trip to Cornouaille, the western part of Brittany, the former economy minister was meeting with representatives of the powerful local fishing industry. While discussing their concerns, Jacques Pichon, the head of fishing company La Houle, said Brexit was by far the biggest issue the sector faced.

Others joined in. The fear, they said, was that the U.K.’s split from the EU would bring an end to the Common Fisheries Policy, which grants them fishing rights in British waters.

“Brexit will not go well because Brexit cannot go well,” Macron replied. “But I’ll make [the fishing problem] a red line in our negotiations with the U.K.”

If he is elected president in May, that is. And if France manages to convince its EU partners that fishing is a topic worth fighting for and not, as Pichon and others fear, a tiny part of a wider deal.

Macron looks like the only candidate able to squeeze out Marine Le Pen on the far right or François Fillon on the right.

The Macron method was on full display in Brittany last week: Arrange to meet a targeted group with specific problems; read the brief beforehand and come prepared; once on the ground, listen intently and give the impression that your audience is helping you form an opinion.

It has helped him to third place in the presidential race, according to pollsters, as large crowds cheer him on at rallies, defying pundits' predictions in the fall that his campaign would fizzle out within weeks.

In the space of two days in Brittany, Macron visited a dairy farm, a transport company, the fish market and a pork producer (Brittany is, after all, home to more than two-thirds of the 13 million or so French pigs).

Europe came up at every stop. And every time, Macron repeated his well-honed mantra that he sees Europe "not as the problem, but as the solution.”

It has made him a rare beast: a French politician getting applause for promoting European integration.

Bubble unburst

The Macron "bubble," which Socialist and conservative opponents predicted would burst before Christmas, has done no such thing. Macron now has such momentum that he is seen as the only candidate able to squeeze out either the far-right's Marine Le Pen or mainstream conservative François Fillon, the favorites to make it to the second round of the presidential election on May 7.

If anything, his chances have improved after the first round of the Socialist presidential primary Sunday, which saw leftist Benoît Hamon come in way ahead of center-left former Prime Minister Manuel Valls.

Opponents are so worried they have begun to set their sights on Macron.

The Fillon campaign has already been on the attack, aiming to make the former economy minister partly responsible for the actions of the unpopular outgoing president, François Hollande.

Fillon has so far refrained from speaking up himself, but he has sent his underlings on the offensive. Pierre Danon, a retired businessman and senior Fillon adviser, penned an op-ed in Le Monde describing Macron as a co-author of “policies of status quo and public debt” that led France "to bankruptcy.”

As for Socialist Party officials, they first poured scorn on Macron for his “betrayal” of Hollande when he resigned from the cabinet last August. Then they begged him, in vain, to take part in the Socialist primary. And now they are openly debating whether to support him if the chosen Socialist candidate — either Hamon or Valls — fails to impress.

Official Socialist backing hardly fills Macron with joy. “I’m not seeking [the party's] support – what I want is to convince a majority of the French,” he said before a campaign rally in Quimper last week.

A couple of days later, he held an impromptu press conference in Paris to hammer the point home, saying he fully intends to remain in charge both of his electoral platform and those who would implement it in parliament: Macron’s En Marche movement will field candidates in every one of France’s 577 electoral districts in June elections for the National Assembly, he said — and they could be MPs who have defected from both right and left.

Macron is clearly keen on keeping his distance from the ruling party and from his mentor, Hollande. “I’m not seeking [Hollande’s] support,” he said last week, adding: “I think it would be a good idea for the president to remain neutral in this presidential race.”

“You’d think he considers Hollande radioactive,” a Socialist MP who supports Macron said.

Macron rallies are not rock concerts ... His speeches are long and dull at times, but supporters don’t seem to mind.

But Macron seems keen to spare the Socialists whose support he might need later on to help him govern. In Quimper, he lauded Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, who happens to be Brittany’s Socialist strongman and chair of the regional council.

Richard Ferrand, a Socialist MP from Brittany, was among the first to support Macron and has since become En Marche’s general secretary. A sign of the times is that the excommunication threats that came Ferrand's way from the Socialist Party when he announced he was joining Macron two months ago have stopped — and Ferrand has since been joined on Macron's side by more than a handful of Socialist MPs. “I’m confident that over time Socialists will realize who is the true progressive candidate,” Ferrand said.

One reason why the Socialist attacks have receded is that they haven't worked. As was clear at the rally in Quimper, what opponents describe as Macron’s flaws — both personal and political — are deemed qualities by his supporters: He has no previous political experience? “That means he will have a fresh eye on things,” said Chloe Beunet, a retired public servant in her 60s, who said she’d voted for the left all her life.

His past as a Rothschild banker? “At least it means that he knows something about the economy and finance,” said Chloe’s husband Gerard, a long-time conservative voter, who insisted “taking a big pay cut to come into politics means that he’s honest and not in for the money.”

He hasn't published a detailed policy platform? “I don’t want a presidential candidate to have detailed prescriptions for everything, I want him to have a vision and principles,” said Jean-Louis Jourdain, 50, who has “always voted for the Socialists."

Standing room only

The venue in Quimper was full when Macron was in town, with 2,000 supporters in attendance and 500 more allowed in later by security. Another 500, who waited in the cold and damp for more than an hour, had to be turned away. Socialist primary candidates are happy when attendance at their rallies is in the low hundreds.

Macron rallies are not rock concerts, the crowds don’t go wild and only clap and cheer with restraint. His speeches are long and dull at times, but supporters don’t seem to mind.

Once the official Socialist candidate is known, after a second round of voting on Sunday, the presidential campaign will start in earnest. Also on Sunday, Fillon will outline his platform. That's when Macron will feel the full force of his opponents’ attacks — starting with the vagueness of his proposals.

“I’d love to have an opinion on his platform, but have you seen it somewhere, can you help me find it?” a senior Fillon aide asked.

Macron said last week he would publish his detailed program by the end of February. A French scholar who took part in a three-hour session with him a couple of weeks ago on foreign affairs and national security — areas that are not Macron’s forte — came away impressed with the homework he’d done beforehand.

“He listens intently, takes copious notes, and asks the right questions,” the expert said.

Voters will soon expect Macron to provide the answers himself.