Rodeo time – Part I
To say Jérémie Beyou’s new VPLP-designed foiler Charal made a big impression during her first competitive outing would be an understatement. And even though the team had to retire from the Trophée Azimut with electrical issues, the altitudes they reached in flight shouted at everyone watching ‘welcome to the next level’. Jocelyn Blériot talks to Vincent Lauriot-Prévost, Quentin Lucet and Daniele Capua from designers VPLP
Vincent Lauriot-Prévost: ‘The surprising thing for us was to see how the boat’s behaviour perfectly matched what our models had predicted: superimpose the digital image and the actual picture, you’ll see what I mean. We’d never seen it come that close yet with any previous boat. Ever.’
40 SEAHORSE
No wonder our curiosity was piqued… ‘From a historical perspective’, says Quentin Lucet to start us off, ‘looking at the first VPLP-Verdier Imocas that appeared in 2005, the 2008-generation already repre- sented a step ahead by focusing on power combined with reduced weight. ‘Then in 2012 we pushed this same philosophy harder and then four years later in 2016 we added foils… Not exactly as an afterthought, but without really chal- lenging the overall architecture of the hull, bearing in mind that at the time we were far from certain that these appendages would ever be exploitable by a single guy in a round-the-world context.’
But once the 2016 Vendée was done and dusted, there were no questions left. ‘We knew for a fact that foils did work and they had proved manageable, so the way forward was clear: we needed to design a “native” foiler.’
But far from being a ‘simple’ evolution, with more emphasis on foiling, Charal is a departure as far as the design brief and structural implications are concerned. ‘That premise – the native foiler – was the centre of our discussions with the Charal
team from the outset,’ adds Quentin. One has to remember that Jérémie Beyou took a gamble when retrofitting his Maître Coq (the former Foncia 2) with foils, explaining even before the start of the last Vendée that they would be starting a campaign for 2020 with a new (flying) boat on the horizon. A splendid third place in Les Sables later, Beyou is now unfolding his longterm plan, which involves a strik- ingly aggressive rocket ship whose distinc- tive appendages were already examined in some detail by Patrice Carpentier in last month’s edition of Seahorse.
‘Looking back at where we’re coming from, it’s worth remembering that the pre- vious generation of boats also needed to be able to perform with traditional, straight daggerboards – that was in the design briefs,’ interjects Daniele Capua. ‘This is a massive change, since now our clients are ready to take the risk and ask us to over- look that consideration completely and work towards pure foiling machines.’ It’s as if a crutch had been removed, with exciting prospects in terms of performance of course, but also a potential added brittle- ness factor in the programme. The logical
ALL PHOTOS YVAN ZEDDA
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
