Marc Guillemot and Charles Caudrelier Skippers Of Open 60 Safran (Photo by Jean-Marie Liot / DPPI)
In between the simple routine of just keeping their boats at maximum speed in the right direction, and picking their way as best they can, there is a certain quiet satisfaction underpinning the efforts of the top three duos in the IMOCA Open 60 fleet as these Transat Jacques Vabre leaders set themselves up to break into the Caribbean.
That is not to say that any of them have already accepted their position now will be the same when they cross the finish line off Costa Rica’s Puerto Limon, but with the gap between leader Safran and second placed Groupe Bel grown by 20 miles to 81 miles early this morning, and the margin between Bel and Mike Golding Yacht Racing, in turn 82 miles, then each feels they have breathing space which they perhaps did not expect this morning.
Instead of the expected initial compression, in fact Marc Guillemot and Charles Caudrelier slipped away another 20 miles overnight on Safran, a gain which surprised Guillemot’s co-skipper enough to wonder this morning if their pursuers had a technical problem.
But in fact Safran has just had more a little more wind.
Satisfaction, such as it is, aboard Mike Golding Yacht Racing comes from being back in something closer to full racing shape after British skipper Golding spent much of yesterday night dealing with an electrical charging issue which firstly meant they could not start the engine, which then developed so they had a complete power failure.
But for his hard day’s night and recuperation yesterday Golding has remedied their problems and was pleased to be back in a more competitive mode early this morning.
Winds for the leaders are still very up and down, variable in direction. The leading trio have anything between seven and 12 knots this morning and winds will drop more at times as they approach the arc of West Indies islands
But the gap back to Michel Desjoyeaux and Jérémie Beyou has also opened another 20 miles to 290 miles between Mike Golding Yacht Racing and Desjoyeaux’s Foncia. Golding said his preference this morning would be to have been a little more south, but given his problems yesterday that has not been possible.
Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson creep closer to fifth all the time, this morning getting to less than 17 miles of Veolia Environnement their slightly more southerly position has been beneficial to the British Aviva duo, but both were slowed to less than ten knots this morning.
Battle continues in the middle order of the Transat Jacques Vabre
After successfully regaining sixth place yesterday and battling hard to maintain their position overnight, Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson onboard Aviva have narrowly lost out to 1876 in this morning’s polling.
The three boats currently in the middle of the fleet – 1876, Veolia Environnement and Aviva – are all positioned within 15 miles of each other and with over 2000 miles of the route to Costa Rica remaining, the battle for fifth to seventh place is set to continue.
The 10h00 race ranking positioned Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson, onboard Aviva, in seventh place, 575 miles behind race leader Safran.
“We have just spent darkness coasting along in a dying breeze under a canopy of bright stars. Flat water and warm temperatures have made it an uneventful but also a wonderful night’s sailing.
As predicted we will be fighting light airs with those around us. If we can keep working hard and keep at the front of this little group then we will reach the stronger breeze about 36 hours quicker. It is amazing getting a grib file now for weather information and realising how far we have come because we are also getting the Caribbean weather too.
To play tribute to this particularly tropical theme we also celebrated shower day onboard Aviva. So now she and her dynamic duo smell of roses as you would expect.”
Franco-Spanish duo Yves Parlier and Pachi Rivero are on good form this morning, making west at good speed in good breeze. On the quickest boat in the fleet just now, 1876 Rivero remarked that they will make their move south later today, but just 40 miles of DTF (distance to finish) separates fifth from eighth.
Quotes:
Mike Golding (GBR) Mike Golding Yacht Racing: “We had a problem, a big problem. As the batteries got low the engine would not start, and so the engine start batteries had not been getting trickle charge and so the engine would not start. That created an earthing problem on the engine as well, and so with no engine…no lights, nothing at all. It was pretty dodgy for a while. The switchboard 12v charger has blown, we had a spare but it has blown as well, so what I had to do was lift one of the main batteries out of the bank and use it to start the engine, so that took up most of yesterday night and the boat was a complete tip after that. So yesterday was spent getting tidied and getting the boat moving again, so so far tonight has been relatively quiet. We had no electronics, no navigation, no electronics, and it was pitch dark and so trying to see the wheel compass is hopeless. So we have ended up where we are. I am not especially pleased…we are where we are, we should be further forwards, we should be further south, but we are where we are.
I think there may still be some options and opportunities, but meantime we do need to make sure we get out of this light stuff. We probably haven’t done the job we wanted to to get out of it, we are doing 10 knots just now and probably have eight knots of breeze.”
Charles Caudrelier Bénac (FRA) Safran: “ It is going very well. We are trying in a way to understand what is going on because we expected less wind but that is not so. There must be a reason why we have gained so many miles on Groupe Bel during the night, maybe they have some technical problems?
We had a good night, between 10 and 15 knots, rolling along, and it makes good speed. We did two or three watches of three hours each and made no sail changes so it did not go too badly, and there are no clouds or squalls. But on the other hand the trade winds are broken down, and if there are no clouds during the day it will be hard because there will be no wind.
We are 1500 miles from the finish and it is just great. We can still break things if there are stronger trade winds, and there will be many manoeuvres before we get there.”
“The passage through the West Indies arc? Well it can make a big difference and we have already chosen, but we are not telling anything……”
Battle continues in the middle order of the Transat Jacques Vabre
After successfully regaining sixth place yesterday and battling hard to maintain their position overnight, Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson onboard Aviva have narrowly lost out to 1876 in this morning’s polling.
The three boats currently in the middle of the fleet – 1876, Veolia Environnement and Aviva – are all positioned within 15 miles of each other and with over 2000 miles of the route to Costa Rica remaining, the battle for fifth to seventh place is set to continue.
The 10h00 race ranking positioned Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson, onboard Aviva, in seventh place, 575 miles behind race leader Safran.
Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson’s latest diary entry received on 19 November 2009 at 0700 GMT:
“We have just spent darkness coasting along in a dying breeze under a canopy of bright stars. Flat water and warm temperatures have made it an uneventful but also a wonderful night’s sailing.
As predicted we will be fighting light airs with those around us. If we can keep working hard and keep at the front of this little group then we will reach the stronger breeze about 36 hours quicker. It is amazing getting a grib file now for weather information and realising how far we have come because we are also getting the Caribbean weather too.
To play tribute to this particularly tropical theme we also celebrated shower day onboard Aviva. So now she and her dynamic duo smell of roses as you would expect.”
Dee and Brian
Dee Caffari On Day Eleven Aboard Aviva (Photo by Team Aviva)
Alex Thompson On Hugo Boss (Photo by DR)
When lying in fourth place in the Transat Jacques Vabre race from Le Havre to Porto Limon, Costa Rica, the British IMOCA Open 60 Hugo Boss last night reported hitting an unidentified object in the water, damaging the starboard bow of the boat and causing them to take in water. They have slowed the boat right down, have a pump working, are managing the ingress of water.
Alex Thomson, the skipper, has reported that conditions are stable and they are not in any imminent danger. The British pair are in regular contact with TJV Race Director Jean Maurel. They have been in discussion with their shore team, and with a structural engineer from SP before they make any decisions as to what their options are.
Hugo Boss was approximately 400 miles south of the Azores.
Thomson said:
“I am gutted, we have done the hard bit, been through the storms and the way ahead was looking very easy. We will monitor the situation overnight and assess in the morning what our options are,”
Further down the race course, abreast of the Canary Islands the three way battle at the front of the fleet continues with Safran still holding the upper hand as the trio negotiate the more tricky downwind conditions at the lower edge of a high pressure before breaking into a more stable SE’ly wind flow.
As under-pressure leaders Marc Guillemot and Charles Caudrelier on Safran bent to the task of holding off the rapidly advancing, Kito de Pavant and Francois Gabart, their smiling, chilled rivals on identical design sistership, the laughing cow’ logo’d Groupe Bel, back on eighth placed Aviva Britain’s Dee Caffari declared herself one ‘happy bunny’ as she and Brian Thompson hit the trade-winds conveyor belt, into the warmth , the sunshine and brisker winds, for some fast, champagne sailing and a chance to unwrap herself from the layers of warm, waterproof clothing she has had on for the best part of week,
But for Alex Thomson, once again it is the unfortunately familiar welling up of bitter disappointment to deal with, as he and co-skipper Ross Daniel are forced to head for the Azores, limping north with Hugo Boss taking on water after they hit something at high speed yesterday afternoon. After a night at slow speed trying to keep the damaged area, an indentation of about 30 cms, Thomson and Daniel’s race is over, all too soon.
If the anger and frustration feels like déjà vu after having to pull out of last year’s Vendée Globe with structural damage sustained in the first big storm, less than 36 hours into the race, Thomson’s shred of consolation this time is that he had done a good job through the worst storm and had earned a strong position with Hugo Boss. But this afternoon that was a bitter pill to swallow. He had certainly achieved the objective of giving former boat captain Ross Daniel a first hand insight into the rigours of ocean racing on the Open 60 with a view to maximising gear reliability for future endeavours.
When Daniel went forwards after striking an object with a thud during yesterday afternoon he found four tonnes of water in the watertight compartment.
“ It is impossible to repair it, not because it is very big, but because there is water coming in and we can’t stop it from coming in. And so we will retire from the race and head for the Azores.” Thomson confirmed this afternoon.
“ We had told ourselves we had done the worst part of it. We had been through the storm and probably had had the worst of it. We had been knocked down by a breaking waves, and this boat is strong as hell. I am totally confident in with its strength in any way, in fact I am
amazed that you can put a boat through that. So I am quite pissed off that we are having to retire from the race because someone has discarded some rubbish in the sea which has caused a hole in the hull.”
Safran has more or less stabilised their losses to Groupe Bel, but the leader’s margin is down to 28 miles and there is the promise of an engaging duel to the Caribbean as the leaders pick their way west and south down the edge of the high pressure system. Mike Golding and Javier Sanso have dropped back to some 70 miles behind on Mike Golding Yacht Racing but they have some 200 miles of cushioning to fourth placed Roland Jourdaind and Jean Luc Nelias on Veolia Environnement. And they have their hands full as Michel Desjoyeaux and Jérémie Beyou are up to fifth with just two miles to catch the Foncia skipper’s long time sparring partner, friend and rival.
Dee Caffari, GBR Aviva:
“ Things are wonderful, the sun is shining, it is warm and I am not being hosed constantly in the face by water. I am about to shed some layers and so I am a very happy bunny.”
“ Since we left the Azores we had a big lightning squall, loads of wind and then it shifted and now the wind has just gone behind us, so similar to the rest of the pack really, so we are hanging in there as we all converge in this kind of meeting zone, and going round the edge
of a high pressure rather than dealing with depressions, so we have blue skies, fluffy white clouds and the boat is going like a dream. So it is time to get these niggly jobs which were a problem in the bad weather sorted out one by one.”
“ We have some chafe on some lines to deal with, the wind instruments are not the best at the moment, but I think that is a common occurrence with the bumping around these boats have taken. I am having to charge with the engine rather than the generator which is a bit slow and laborious, especially as the temperatures are rising, but really nothing which is
going to stop us getting to Costa Rica if we have a say.”
“ We are all on a bit of a conveyor belt at the moment, it is quite funny the way we have all converged again, no matter which way we came. And now the weather is quite obvious so it is going to be very obvious where everyone will go and so we have to hang in there on boat-speed and claw back some miles. We started so well, lost a lot of miles in the bad weather and now we have to get some back.”
“ We can be competitive now, we did some jobs this morning which meant we were kind of slow changing up the gears, but now we are full main, big Code sails and the boatspeed is pretty good.”Alex Thomson, GBR (Hugo Boss):
“We were sailing along with jib-top, full main TWA about 130 degrees, wind speed about 22 knots surfing at over 20 knots, probably averaging 18 knots, about three o’clock in the afternoon we hit something…. a pretty good thump….i did not see it, it did not hit the rudder, but for sure we can tell we hit something. We had a good look around the boat, and by the time Ross got forwards, the boat was getting very, very hard to steer, and by the time he got up forward one of the watertight compartments had about 4 tonnes of water in it, which is why the boat was not steering. We took some pictures and sent them back to our shore crew. This morning we have reassessed the damage, decided it is impossible to repair it, not because it is very big, but because there is water coming in and we can’t stop it from coming in. And so we will retire from the race and head for the Azores. The damage is on the starboard side of the bow, about three or four metres back, not on the centreline off to the starboard side but about half a metre out. What we can see on the inside is a depression, so
something has clobbered the outside and made a big indent and there is water coming through, not very big about 300mm or so. We had told ourselves we had done the worst part of it. We had been through the storm and probably had had the worst of it. We had been knocked down by a breaking waves, and this boat is strong as hell. I am totally confident in with its strength in any way, in fact I am amazed that you can put a boat through that. So I am quite pissed off that we are having to retire from the race because someone has
discarded some rubbish in the sea which has caused a hole in the hull.”
“ I was thinking to myself yesterday lunch time, about one o’clock that it was fantastic sailing, Ross was steering, we were in good position, we had been through the worst of the storm, and we had done the riskiest bit, so to get damaged by someone else’s rubbish is just
gutting. Really gutting.”
“ We have shored up the area to make sure it does not get any worse and we will slowly limp towards Horta. We are leaning over just now with the keel on the other side, but I am sure that more water will come when we get under way, but I am not worried at all that we will not be able to keep up with the amount of water coming in.”
Marc Guillemot, FRA (Safran):
“During the night we carried out a few gybes to get into the position we had planned to be able to make our way through the Antilles. This was our strategy and we had to stick with it. In relation to the finishing line, which is the ultimate goal, our rivals have narrowed the gap. In relation to us, it is still the same situation as yesterday.”
“It’s more relaxing when you are the hunter, but we’re quite pleased about being the hunted. At the moment, we are certainly not feeling any stress, and our goal is to continue along our own route. Charles has spent a lot of time working on the navigation, and has laid the
foundations, which we then take decisions about together. We’re just where we want to be for what lies ahead and we shall see whether we were right or not.”
Safran hold a lead of just less than 34 miles, as the chasing pair squeeze up a little .
Now in third, after erring closer to the centre of the high and having less wind perhaps, Mike Golding Yacht Racing are less than five miles behind Kito de Pavant and Francois Gabart on Groupe Bel.
Golding said this morning that conditions for them remain tricky, quite unstable under spinnaker with a difficult seaway. Trying to keep the boat settled in course with their autopilots remains testing and so they continue to maximize their time spent hand steering.
Due to the Hugo Boss problems Spanish entry 1876 is now up to fourth whilst steady progress up the fleet continues for Michel Desjoyeaux and Jérémie Beyou who are up to seventh now on Foncia, overtaking Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson on Aviva during yesterday evening.
Foncia’s next target is Desjoyeaux’s long time friend and rival Roland Jourdain on Veolia Environnement, just 40 miles ahead, but Veolia Environnement still have some lighter airs to cross while Foncia who were quickest in the fleet this morning, making two knots faster than the leaders.
Quotes:
Francois Gabart (FRA) Groupe Bel: “It’s going great. Since yesterday morning it’s been tops. We are sliding along under gennaker and it’s really pleasant to steer. Even when you get wet it’s good, so we are happy sliding along in the Atlantic. The trade winds are what we have been looking forward to since leaving France.
But the wind is not so stable, in strength or direction, so we have to steer quit a lot. We are not even that far off gybing. And of course having made it into second we have a smile on our faces this morning.
But you have to fight for the small gains, every mile, always trying to go as fast as possible. Safran is the same boat as ours, so we can’t count on being a better design. And so if we want to catch them we need to use the small wind shifts. In the next few hours we will do the gybe and then after that it is roughly a straight line to the West Indies. But all the time I think the winds will be quite unstable, there are always going to be options and ploys to follow, right into the Caribbean.”
Mike Golding (GBR) Mike Golding Yacht Racing: “We are just under kite and just trying to steer the boat with the pilot. We gybed and so that turned out be a bit of a mission. It is good, we are passing through the ridge of the high pressure and trying to choose how to proceed next, conditions are good but there is a bit of a sea running which makes it a bit tricky with the kite and obviously we are having to be a little attentive because we don’t have any wind gear, we had a little problem through the gybe with a squeezer, so have had to change kites, but otherwise all quite normal and cracking along quite nicely.”
Sam Davies and Sidney Cavinet on Artemis Ocean Racing (Photo by Mark Lloyd)
It’s as if the scriptwriters have a hot line to the weather gods. Friday 13th and the Transat Jacques Vabre fleet have their toughest conditions yet, with storm force gusts, mean windspeeds for those in the north of around 50 knots, huge seas and the boats down to tiny sail areas as they live out what promises to be the most difficult period.
True to the plot-line the winds built at around midnight, and skippers spoken to early this morning say they expect to have seen the worst of it by they time they get into Saturday.
Conditions on deck are close to impossible and below decks the duos try to stop themselves from being flung around the inside of their boats like pinballs.
As record breaking British skipper Dee Caffari – the only woman to have circumnavigated the planet non-stop solo in opposite directions – reported from Aviva: “It’s survival conditions. We are just working to get through it, looking after the boat and ourselves.”
Kito de Pavant, from Groupe Bel, summed it up: “It’s a war!”
Jeff Cuzon on second placed BT: ‘It’s horrible.”
Conditions for the group in the south are marginally better but it is the Safran of Marc Guillemot and Charles Caudrelier, in the northern vanguard, which still heads the rankings by 18.7 miles from Seb Josse and Curzon on BT.
In the south Michel Desjoyeaux and Jérémie Beyou on Foncia are in a SW’ly wind on port tack and have pulled back around 20 miles since last night but still have a deficit of some 245 miles on the leading pack, an seem set to continue into lighter headwinds.
Somewhat ominously perhaps, the boat in the furthest north remains Alex Thomson’s black hulled Hugo Boss, was the quickest this morning, with the best VMG of the fleet.
Mike Golding and Javier Sanso retain their third place on the IMOCA Open 60 standings on Mike Golding Yacht Racing just less than 40 miles in arrears to Safran, while Caffari and Brian Thompson and seventh, behind Alex Thomson and Ross Daniel on Hugo Boss whose distance behind the leaders is very little changed since the same time yesterday morning.
Deliverance, in some form, should come at the Azores where the fleet seems set to compact again a little with some lighter breezes, although there are still small systems around to be negotiated or utilised to best effect.
In the Multi50 fleet Crepes Whaou have been sticking to the survival recipe in their new boat but are emerging with a lead of 184 miles.
With Prince de Bretagne safely in Vigo, Galicia for assessment and repairs, only three multi’s are actively racing just now.
Safaran (Photo by Jean Marie Loit / DPPI)
Quotes:
JF Cuzon (FRA) BT: “The conditions are very difficult. Since midnight we have had between 35 and 60 knots. It’s tough, it’s horrible, it’s impressive. You try to preserve the boat as much as you can. The swell is powerful but the most impressive thing is the gusts of wind. It goes up so quickly and that is what makes it so difficult.
Then today maybe round midday it should start to drop.
….there, we have 53 knots of wind, I need to go….”
In his message sent shortly after he confirmed that they were sailing only under deep reef mainsail.
Dee Caffari (GBR), Aviva: “Things are a bit messy. We have 40-50 knots squalls. It has been like this for the last three hours. We took the staysail down and put out the storm jib but did not unfurl it because we are just overpowered. It is consistently 35, gusting to 40 and 50.
It is definitely in for the next 12 hours. It is uncomfortable and there is nothing we can do about it. We just have to survive it and so we are in survival mode which is a bit frustrating, but it is about getting through this and coming out the other side and get back to sailing. The boat seems to handling it well, Brian is a cool, calm cucumber and is having a good effect on me. We’ve had our fair share of issues and problems but so far we seem to be surviving.”
Alex Thomson (GBR), Hugo Boss:
“ All is well on board. We had a bit on an issue with the J3 which unfurled itself in 50 knots of wind but Rossco dealt with it and furled it away. Ross banged his wrist on the first night out but he has been battling on through the pain, he is a real trooper.”
“It is incredible on board. You cannot move around anywhere or do anything, you can’t go to the toilet. In fact we have not even managed to make a cup of tea since the start and both Ross and I are avid tea drinkers.”
“But we are moving up the rankings OK, which is nice, but at the moment survival is the most important thing, but as soon as the wind eases off we will be able to really put the hammer down the more miles we get south.”
Mike Golding (GBR), Mike Golding Yacht Racing:
“ It was a rough night really and now we are hoping in the next hour or so to see the back of the squalls which have been coming through up to 65 knots, and just horrendous seas but I am sure that all the boats are struggling in these conditions. It is not an easy time.”
“ We are both fine. Javier has just gone for some rest. We have both been up all night with just such extreme conditions. We are just trying to push through them and not break anything.”
“ I think at the moment we are just pleased to be still on the race course, we are having to squeeze up a little to try and find a line through, but I have always been quite happy tactically where are, to the south of this group.
“And I’ll be pleased to be the first out of the worst.”
“ We are lining up to pass the Azores in 12 hours of so, and we’ll see what happens there.”
Michel Desjoyeaux, (FRA), Foncia:
“It is a bit wet here. We had a front pass over then a rough night with the wind increasing and a shift around daybreak and since then it has gone SSW’ly. It is bumpy, everything shaking. It is quite impressive but it passes and that is the way it is. We are getting along between 12 and 14 knots all the time and mostly the wind has been low 30′s. The most we’ve seen is 48 knots. And in a few hours we should see some calmer conditions. The seas will remain for a bit, but the winds will abate steadily.”
Roland Jourdain (FRA) Foncia:
“ We tore off the cars at the head of the mainsail when we were taking a reef in. The winds have been between 40 and 45 knots, we took a first reef, then a second and then we had the problem. We realized the problem and immediately dropped the mainsail. We can’t sail with more than two reefs, which is fine for the moment. But if we want to be competitive to the end of the race then we need to stop to repair it.”
“We will stop in Horta in the Azores to make a repair as quickly as possible. If everything is OK it should be done quickly. We should get into the port relatively easily and the repair is not complicated and it is not a big thing to repair.”
“ What is costly to us though is changing course, we were very happy with our option.
Anway we don’t want to give up, we want to stay in the race and we will do everything to get to Costa Rica. We have had better times but that is the way it goes.”
Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson On Aviva (Photo by Lloyd Images)
Demanding conditions and the loss of a wind instrument have made for a testing fourth
night onboard Aviva for Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson. The British duo is, however, still within the leading pack of the IMOCA Open 60 class due to their determination and team work.
With the strong winds and difficult conditions set to last for the next 48 hours, Caffari and Thompson will need to draw on their combined experience to make the best of the situation until they can safely attempt to execute a full repair.
Harry Spedding, Aviva Ocean Racing Campaign Manager added: “Last night Dee and Brian were racing in over 40 knots of wind and big Atlantic swell. Just before dusk one of the two wind instruments at the top of the mast was literally flicked off with the force of movement. The other
instrument has been playing up. Of course any boat can be sailed without these instruments, but it makes racing a whole lot harder.
“Dee and Brian would have been relying on the instruments to ease the decision making on both course and sail choice. With the Wind Direction showing, a tactical shift in the wind can help to make gains towards the finish; with the Wind Speed showing the choice of sail is made obvious. With neither of these two things working Dee and Brian will be relying much more on their
experience to make the decisions of sail choice.
“When one of the two people onboard is resting, the other is on deck. When they are not driving the boat they are trimming the sails, and when they trim the sails for speed the autopilot will drive. Normally this would be set on a Wind Angle setting, so that the boat remains on a course relative to the wind. With no wind instruments the pilot can drive the boat on the compass setting, it is just less efficient.
Dee and Brian will today try and make a patch up that will last the next few days. However they will not be back up to speed for a couple of days, when the sea state may drop enough to allow one of them to go to the top of the mast and effect a proper repair.”
Aviva At Start Line (Photo by Lloyd Images)
The 10h00 race ranking positioned Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson, onboard Aviva , in sixth place, 57.8 miles behind race leader BT .
Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson’s latest diary entry received on 12 November 2009 at 0825 GMT :
“ It is difficult to write today as it is so bumpy. We have been through many squalls of 40 knots in the last night-time hours. We were waiting to tack when the time was right like so many of our little group we have found ourselves sailing with. We knew it was right when we saw a little shift and also in the position reports everyone else had also tacked, now we just needed a window of opportunity, that was a light patch to do our manoeuvre in.
I was grateful there are two of us because nothing seems so bad with two. 35 knots saw us tack
and that was the last we knew about the wind as we no longer have a wand at the top of the mast. Ignorance is bliss and without the numbers the squalls were not as bad. The pitch dark squalls had some clear skies between them and we struggled with the stars through the cascades of sea water stinging our eyes. We were struggling to see stars from vessel lights or maybe we are just a
little fatigued .”
Dee and Brian
Brit Air (Photo by Marcel Mochet)
A time for reflection and rest in France, home of the Transat Jacques Vabre, Armistice Day was certainly not observed by the malicious Atlantic weather systems into which the IMOCA Open 60′s and Multi 50 fleets were pounding over the course of the fourth day of this race from Le Havre to Puerto Limon, Costa Rica.
Relief should come by the weekend, and forecasters promise some occasional respite. Ominously, perhaps, the worst effect of the systems is now due during Friday, the 13th, but as the IMOCA Open 60 fleet work their way SW towards the Azores some skippers were counting down the hours to escape from the miserable conditions, and to see how their strategies play out.
The divide between the boats in the north and the south has become even more pronounced during the middle part of today, with Michel Desjoyeaux and Jérémie Beyou on Foncia now more than 400 miles south and east of their rivals in the north.
British duo Alex Thomson and Ross Daniel on Hugo Boss may have been feeling slightly exposed – lonely even – on their more extreme northerly course. No sooner had a slightly rueful Thomson admitted, early this morning, that his preference, in hindsight, would have been to be in closer touch to the group of boats just to his south, than up popped 1876 only 22 miles astern.
The Spanish IMOCA Open 60, with French co-skipper Yves Parlier – double winner of this biennial race – had taken the option to go for 24 hours in ‘stealth’ mode during which their position and progress is not published – as they hiked north on to a routing which has gained
considerable credence over the last 24 hours.
The equation under scrutiny now is whether to endure much tougher, windier conditions for a short period in the north to get to the preferred wind shift first, or to stay – more prudently – south and profit that way.
Lying seventh and eighth respectively with deficits of 61 and 86 miles, on this afternoon’s schedule Hugo Boss and 1876 were the quickest boats in the fleet this afternoon, by margin of between two and four knots.
After taking the lead on the pre-dawn schedule yesterday, Seb Josse and Jeff Curzon on BT continue to hold on in the IMOCA Open 60 class, with a margin of just under 15 miles to maintain a controlling grip on the northerly group, perhaps with the exception of Hugo Boss. During the late afternoon BT, Mike Golding Yacht Racing and Groupe Bel were the first to tack SW.
Britain’s Mike Golding, along with Spanish co-skipper Javier Sanso, retains fourth place with sistership Aviva of Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson just less than five miles behind, but still making NW this afternoon.
After arriving in Concearneau just after lunch time this afternoon Armel Le Cléac’h and Nicolas Troussel spent the afternoon assessing the repair options to their mainsail mast-track and the forecasted weather conditions, looking their options for a possible return to the race course.
Due to the combination of predicted storms in the Bay of Biscay, their deficit on the front of the fleet, and their desire not to compromise their IMOCA Open 60 in any way, the BritAir duo, in agreement with their team, decided the prudent option was to retire from the race.
Alex Thomson (GBR), skipper Hugo Boss:
“I had a phone call half an hour ago to say that Estrella have popped up out of her stealth mission and she is 20 miles behind us here in the north. I haven’t had a chance to plot the position yet, but if Yves Parlier – one of the great legends of solo sailing - has decided
to come this way then it obviously means we’re going the right way! Or we hope it does anyway…..”
Javier Sanso (ESP), co-skipper Mike Golding Yacht Racing:
““It is going well, we are making some progress down south. We have 3 reefs and a staysail, bouncing up and down, like in a washing machine. It is incredibly wet on deck and a very bumpy. It is miserable, cold and wet. But finally we think that in the next 40 hours we should be out of it….I hope.”
“The pilots and the electronics are still giving us some problems. We are back like the old days with a piece of wool! But in some ways we are getting used to it, but it is very tiring and we have done a lot of hand steering. It is not good in this weather to have to suddenly get on deck to hand steer because the pilot has crashed. And that eats up the energy to suddenly run from inside to hand steer. So we are always ready to jump outside, it has been very, very, very tiring for Mike and I.”
“ It is a good place. We are happy with that just now and will see what happens as we work to get down to the high pressure in the south.”
Vincent Riou (FRA), co-skipper Akena Veranda:
“The first days have been wet, but the conditions are not so difficult for the moment. We have taken the comfortable option, towards the south, and so we don’t have any concerns for the boat. We chose the middle, intermediate road. The conditions so far remain OK, and with
Arnaud we have no worries, we have had good rest, and he is a guy who
is very easy to get along with.”
Marc Guillemot (FRA), Safran:
“It’s pretty brutal. It is crash, crash, crash. Since the end of the night the seas have got worse and the winds have got right up with some big gusts. But it is good to have a sailor like Charles on board. In conditions like these it is hard in the manoeuvres but together we manage. As for our options, well this is what we chose and we’d still rather be here.”
Michel Desjoyeaux (FRA) Foncia:
“All is well. This beating in the Atlantic was expected, and it was known that the strategies would develop. We will see what happens. Perhaps with Jérémie we have been too cautious. I did think that those closer to the depression would have had more difficulties today.”
“As for Yves Parlier I did not really consider that he would have chosen such an extreme option. So now, we will need to be patient. It is in the long run that we will all be able to make the assessment.”
Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson Before The Start (Photo by Mark Lloyd / Lloyd Images)
At 13:30 GMT today, British sailing duo Dee Caffari and Brian Thompson made a strong start to the 4,800 mile Transat Jacques Vabre race from Le Havre , France to Costa Rica onboard the Open 60 yacht Aviva. This is the last competitive race in the IMOCA calendar, and brings together some of the rivals from the epic Vendée Globe round the world race which saw Caffari finish sixth out of 30 starters to become the first woman to sail solo, non-stop, both ways around the world.
Before departing Le Havre Caffari said:
“It’s great to be back competing against several of the skippers that took part in Vendée Globe – with so many experienced sailors and high speed boats this is guaranteed to be an exciting race both to follow and participate in. I’m really looking forward to sailing with Brian as co-skipper – we’re determined to put in a good show for the British!”
Brian Thompson added:
“We’ve been pushing ourselves pretty hard these last few weeks and now it’s time to put the training into practice. We’re looking forward to pushing Aviva to the limit and being as competitive as we can within such a strong fleet. The thought of the sunnier climes of Costa Rica waiting for us at the finish is definitely something to look forward to as well!”
Joining Caffari, Thompson and Aviva on the start line, were 13 other Open 60 racing yachts of which three are British. It is the first time Caffari and Thompson have sailed two-handed together, having been rivals throughout the 2008 / 09 edition of the Vendée Globe.
The Transat Jacques Vabre has twenty entries in total assembled from two different sailing classes – the Imoca Open 60 monohulls and the Open 50 multihulls. Previous editions of the race have concluded in either Brazil or Columbia with Costa Rica added for the first time this year. The new route will take the fleet across the Caribbean Sea, requiring both tactics and the ability to adapt to changing weather conditions, with the possibility of a light wind finish in the Western Caribbean Sea or even the tail end of a late season hurricane.
Boats Line Up At Le Havre Docks For Start Of Transat Jacques Vabre (Photo by Mochet Marcel)
For some it’s the first big chance to restore pride and confidence after the brutal last edition of the Vendée Globe, to others it is simply the next big challenge on the competition itinerary, but the 2009 edition of the Transat Jacques Vabre, which starts from Le Havre this weekend has drawn a remarkably strong fleet of 14 IMOCA Open 60′s and a fleet of six Multi50 class multihulls which includes three brand new build boats.
With two days to go before the start the atmosphere, if anything, is slightly restrained. The pressures of the global economic downturn has perhaps eliminated some of the adventurers and those who might normally be taking their first steps on the ladder with this biennial classic race.
That means that the IMOCA Open 60 fleet, seven months after the finish of the Vendée Globe, has been pared back to serious teams which are all well funded, highly professional and prepared to approximately the same high level. Meeting their respective international press contingents today both Michel Desjoyeaux, who is out to defend his win in the 2007 edition of this race, and Hugo Boss skipper Alex Thomson individually observed that the fleet of IMOCA Open 60′s for this race contains neither weak boats, nor weak crews.
The area around the Paul Vatine basin where the huge crowds will gather this weekend to send off the fleet, has all been substantially redeveloped, part of Le Havre’s ongoing regeneration. The huge warehouses on the east side of the dock now contain dozens of smart restaurants and shops, a supermarket and a cinema where today more than 500 local schoolchildren were given a colourful insight into ocean racing and the Transat Jacques Vabre race itself by 14 of the race skippers.
Eight of the 28 IMOCA Open 60 skippers here did not finish their Vendée Globe, from the unfortunate Kito de Pavant (Groupe Bel), Alex Thomson (Hugo Boss) and Marc Thiercelin (DCNS) who were among the victims of the first big storm, Jérémie Beyou (who races on Foncia with Michel Desjoyeaux) to Sebastien Josse (BT), Vincent Riou (PRB)now Akena Verandas with Arnaud Boissieres), Mike Golding (Ecover, now Mike Golding Yacht Racing) and Roland Jourdain (Veolia Environnement) who was the last who was soloist who was forced to retire whilst lying second. All are back here, racing this new course to Puerto Limon,Costa Rica. “The whole fleet is quite homogeneous here, quite the same, and there are no bad boats and also no bad crews, so it will be much more difficult.” Cautions Foncia skipper Desjoyeaux, who won the 2007 Transat Jacques Vabre with co-skipper Manu Le Borgne.
“The fleet is going to be tough, for sure. There just are no bad boats. There are no older boats here. But also, looking at the Multi 50 class, that looks exciting and very much more achievable in many ways.” Says Alex Thomson, skipper of one of the four British boats, Hugo Boss, “For us this race is going to depend on what the weather does. If we get some good reaching conditions then we could do well, with some good breeze but if there is a lot of VMG running then we could struggle”.
French sailing legend Yves Parlier returns to the IMOCA Open 60 fleet, sailing on the Spanish flagged 1876 partnering Spain’s Pacchi Rivero. Parlier is a past winner, in 1997 with the late Eric Tabarly, which he still describes as the highlight of his sailing career, and last competed in 1999 with Ellen MacArthur.
British female skippers Sam Davies and Dee Caffari are back in the fray too. Davies is sailing Artemis with Sidney Gavignet, while Caffari is joined on Aviva by Brian Thompson whose third Transat Jacques Vabre this is. While Caffari’s confidence after the Vendée Globe and an all girl Round Britain record attempt on Aviva in the summer, is at all time high, Davies, along with Gavignet is just getting to grips with the very powerful Rogers designed Artemis.
“The level is just so high that it is very hard to judge how we might do. I really just want to finish feeling proud of ourselves and the course we have taken, the way we have sailed. So much will be down to the weather and who does what, but I want to feel we have sailed as close to 100% as we can.” Says Davies, “Really, my mission is just to keep learning the Artemis and to continue the evolution of the boat.”
Dee Caffari, sailing Aviva, is looking to her and Brian Thompson’s combined experience and a boat she now knows very well, to bring them a strong result: “We are both really up for it. Traditionally perhaps I have always been the conservative one, but now, after sailing with the girls in the summer, I have so much more confidence and in this final race with the sponsor I really want to do well. It would be a good thing for the future.”
