Update
The Vendée Globe fleet may essentially be racing in three different classes, but within those groups the competition has been closer than ever seen in a previous solo round-the-world race. Former Virbac skipper Jean-Pierre Dick tells that in the total of six months that he spent racing single and two-handed in the Southern Ocean he never once saw a single other boat. Here Boris Herrmann on Seaexplorer enjoys a tussle with Louis Burton’s Bureau Vallée – the previous race winner as Banque Populaire VIII. This time around on some occasions five or even six Imocas have been racing in sight of each other… after sailing 15,000nm halfway round the world
FOILERS ARE VERY INTERESTING!!!! – Jean and Anne Le Cam I’ve never sailed on a foiling Imoca so it was interesting to have Kevin’s [Escoffier] take on it. These are boats that can go very fast, but it’s ‘on’ or ‘off’ . It doesn’t look easy to deal with. For me they are not boats made for the Vendée Globe, they’re not adapted to what we’re doing here. There is a casting mistake. This ‘flying around the world thing’, only guys on land can talk about it. Anne is a lot less diplomatic: ‘Jean was the first to sail on the
Hydroptère, he knows foilers by heart. The youngsters can’t tell him he’s the rearguard (as opposed to avant-garde!). He was among the first to build very fast boats. He was Formula 40 [multihull] champion, and those boats were really fast and really fragile too. ‘He was a multihull sailor, he knows what it’s about, but he also
knows what the Indian Ocean is like, 4-5m waves, nasty broken seas, he knows it all. Just as he knows when he can launch himself into a low-pressure system off the Iberian coast. At the beginning of the race he was surprised to see the young sailors going around the obstacle [tropical storm Theta]. They all went around the first low-pressure system screaming ‘Mommy, help!’. Nobody went in there except the two old dudes, Alex Thomson and Jean… ‘At that moment he was surprised: “Wait, what are those guys gonna do in the south?”’
CLOSE SHAVE – Patrice Carpentier After an exceptionally tough and exacting repair made to the foil bearing on the port side of Apivia Charlie Dalin was back in the game. He had dropped over 140nm behind the new leader but he was optimistic again! To complete the repair Dalin had worked steadily through a detailed plan using accurate drawings of the replacement carbon composite part he had to cut, bond and then secure in the foil housing from the outside of the hull… suspending himself over the side of the boat from a halyard.
14 SEAHORSE Charlie recalls: ‘On Tuesday morning about two hours before
sunrise I realised that I have water flowing, from time to time, into the cockpit through the halyard tunnel. It has never happened before. I find it odd so I send a message to the team to let them know. Then the second alert: a flooding alarm in the area of the foil casing. ‘I go to check and there’s actually a little water coming in, but
I’m not sure where from. But I find the foil case is full of water and I see my foil moving with a degree of freedom it shouldn’t have. I realise right away that I must have lost the lower bearing mount. At first I don’t dare believe it. I put my camera on a pole and slowed down the boat to film outside and see around the foil. Do I see the mounting? I realise that the lower mounting has disappeared. It was horrible because instantly I saw my Vendée Globe finish. ‘With my team it was agreed to make a replacement wedge with
pieces of carbon and a sheet of foam. I cut out the carbon bits with a grinder, then I assembled the parts and did the gluing. While it cured I slept – I knew the rest was going to be complicated… For the installation I knew I was going to have to hang myself in my shoulder harness from a halyard to reach the exit level of the foil, and then try to hold it in position using pieces coming out from inside the hull. Obviously I would have to keep going back and forth. ‘I was reaching through to the case from the outside of the boat
to try to insert my new wedge, but I had to go back inside to keep trimming the carbon to make it fit. I don’t know how many dozen times I went back and forth to adjust the piece, degrease everything on the boat and the new piece and try to get it into the casing. ‘I could see the sun starting to go down but I was saying to myself
“Charlie, you really have to do this, you have to do this before it is dark because after that it is going to be too late.” Really at the end of my strength and fatigue, I finally managed to insert the piece… Luckily it stayed in while I went back below to secure the piece properly from the inside as we planned. Once done I was able to re-engage with the race and get back on my way. ‘At first all I could think about was sleeping – but there wasn’t
BORIS HERRMANN
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110
