News Around the World
If you are going to win an epic singlehanded marathon on ‘corrected time’ then France has to be the very best place in which to do it, the French public and French sailors respecting the last finisher in every Vendée Globe just as much as they admire the race winner. But we still felt some pity for Yannick Bestaven (above) being awarded the ultimate ocean-racing prize while Charlie Dalin looked on. Two magnificent performances by two of the greatest ocean racers we’ve ever seen – and receiving redress for a life-saving rescue is quite different from being given compensation for being wrongly called OCS… As Bestaven made clear: ‘Today we are two champions’
FRANCE Banque Populaire XI is coming soon The Jules Verne Trophy has always been much sought after… and this is especially true this winter. Witness the intense activity of the Ultims at Lorient in January and February, with the return of Thomas Coville’s team (Sodebo) and the ‘re-departure’ of Franck Cammas and Charles Caudrelier (Edmond de Rothschild), unfortu- nately forced to drop out again after a good run to the Cape of Good Hope… and with a promising weather system ahead of them! Both these teams were forced back with rudder damage – which is a big thing when sailing boats can cruise along steadily at over 40kt in the open ocean. Meanwhile, Team Banque Populaire are completing the construc-
tion of their new Ultim trimaran whose launch is scheduled for spring. After 24 months of research and development and then production, the Maxi Banque Populaire XI is very much awaited… What innovations and developments have been introduced since
Banque Populaire IX (the VPLP design launched four years ago and destroyed at sea one year later during the last Route du Rhum)? What new level of performance is to come? Answers from team director Ronan Lucas: ‘Apart from the floats, the trimaran was completely changed from the masthead to the tips of the foils. The main hull has been modified, the foils are bigger, the rudders too. Aerodynamics have been worked on more seriously this time to limit the drag of the platform. ‘But the bigger objective is to move the overall centre of gravity
to focus the 32m trimaran much more on flight mode. There has been a great deal of progress in this area – but I must add that Banque Populaire XI will still be very fast in Archimedean mode. ‘However, by focusing our work more on the flying mode this time we have reached a higher level of performance compared to Banque
22 SEAHORSE
Populaire IX. We’re also working much more today with the simulator, using the technology used by Team New Zealand, to learn how to manage the foils better at sea, for example. ‘Very few teams have this tool, but fortunately we were able to
validate the accuracy of this software for our purposes by testing it on Banque Populaire IX: the results obtained are very consistent. The technical team and skipper Armel Le Cléac’h use it regularly. ‘This makes it possible to identify the critical trends in developing
these very fast boats; it is a huge time saving. Every time you go to sea onboard this type of boat requires a lot of preparation. The playground of these Ultims is the ocean, and you do not just go out for a day’s sailing as you would with a conventional boat. ‘Thanks to the work carried out on the simulator, once at sea
we will already have all the settings we need and the latest polars to aim for. Instead of spending time trying to discover better settings and adjustments, now we go sailing to validate and fine-tune the settings we already have.’
Weather eye Francis Joyon is a keen observer of every new attempt at the Jules Verne Trophy. The record holder since 2017 aboard the maxi trimaran Idec Sport (the 16-year-old former Groupama 3), sailing with his small crew of Alex Pella, Gwénolé Gahinet, Bernard Stamm, Sébastien Audigane and Clément Surel, in just over 40 days at an average of 22.84kt, Francis nevertheless subscribes to the axiom ‘A record is made to be broken’. A few days after Gitana 17and Sodebohad turned around Francis
gave his opinion: ‘I can see that Gitana, like us at the time, has a small crew, synonymous with lightness. ‘However, it is not possible for me to judge the performance of the Caudrelier-Cammas team on their failed attempt. I notice,
CHRISTOPHE FAVREAU/DPPI
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
