Contents August 2020 FEATURES
4 The real deal BENOIT STICHELBAUT
34What’s next? Take advantage of this unplanned opportunity for a re-boot. But please think before you speak. ROB WEILAND
This will be fascinating Surely there was never real doubt about the 2020 Vendée Globe starting on time? Skippers were getting increasingly vocal about sponsorship expirations and future scheduling clashes – and it does not need a Cray supercomputer to work out that for them a Vendée Globe does a pretty perfect job in terms of social distancing. But for the organisers and sponsors the problems were much greater: losing as many as two million spectators and visitors to the race village was a huge problem and all the parties involved really are now to be congratulated on somehow pressing on with a very positive approach and finding a workable solution. Meanwhile, for technical aficionados the forthcoming race is certain to be a feast, with too many ‘treats’ to list. Imocas are making the transition from canoe to scow with Armel Tripon’s L’Occitane (seen here) the most extreme of the ‘fat nose’ contingency. Bouncing on and off foils has brought about a complete design reversal in pursuit of cleaner take-offs and landings and aiming for smooth flight. Jérémie Beyou’s Charal started out a minimum-drag canoe but modifications have moved her a little closer to Tripon’s Manuard design. Previous-generation Imocas were about building the foils that worked most efficiently with a chosen hull design; the latest hulls are more or less now just delivery tools designed purely to keep the foils working as well and for as much time as possible. And there will then soon be a whole new set of questions as and when rudder elevators are permitted, bringing the likelihood of full flight. Dry lap of the planet, anyone?
COVER: Pierre Bouras/DPPI INSET: Nico Martinez
40 Go your own way HANS KLAAR is not the sort of seafarer you bump into every day of the week, but then neither is our long-distance interviewer ØYVIND BJORDAL
44 Elevating Imoca For some months the VPLP office has been running a discreet study of future Imoca foiling options for the class. And now LUCA RIZZOTTI has seen the results
49 Flight of the Maxis Them again… JOCELYN BLERIOT talks to VPLP’s QUENTIN LUCET about a proposal to ramp up interest in a ‘proper’ modern maxi class
52Master of the dark arts – Part II JO RICHARDS walks JAMES BOYD through the twists and turns of a career that now takes in rotomoulding, dinghy design and Olympic gold
56 Setting the record – Part II FRANK QUEALEY moves our 18-foot skiff chronology on with a ‘scaling down’ to the 6ft beamers and the first appearance of a – or rather the – future America’s Cup-winning designer
REGULARS
6 Commodore’s letter STEVEN ANDERSON
11 Editorial ANDREW HURST
14 Update Better still (for us!), the (sheer) joy of it, better (Cup) times ahead, fingers on (voting) buzzers and
around we (will) go again. LUCA DEVOTI, TERRY HUTCHINSON (AND FAMILY), BOB FISHER, JACK GRIFFIN, JEREMIE BEYOU, ROB KOTHE, JEAN-LUC VAN DEN HEEDE
20World news Masters of the Vendée Globe (or so they hope), how it all began for MICH DESJ, of TONY RAE and kangaroos… facing up to Cup defeat. Plus some clever (and overdue) race directing. ALEX THOMSON, KY HURST, JEREMIE BEYOU, PATRICE CARPENTIER, IVOR WILKINS, BLUE ROBINSON, DOBBS DAVIS
32 Rod Davis
– Decisions decisions Yes, they will shortly have to be made. But how?
36 ORC – Passing the hours Lockdown has allowed time for dedicated
fans of rating mathematics to really crank up their game. But is that exactly a good thing… DOBBS DAVIS
38 52 Super Series
– Focused passion ANDI ROBERTSON gets to know one of the loyallest of all Super Series supporters, ‘multiple’ TP52 enthusiast and skipper TONY LANGLEY
60 RORC news – Tunnel, light EDDIE WARDEN-OWEN
61 TechStreet 62 – Design 73 – Technology
69Seahorsebuild table – Back in
the game? Their man in Adelaide BRET PERRY has got Farr Yacht Design back into one-designs again
76Seahorse regatta calendar
101 Sailor of the Month Not what you’re expecting…
Good times different times. Good times for Dennis Conner’s Stars&Stripes as they lead Iain Murray’s Kookaburra in to the line in Fremantle at the 1987 America’s Cup. Conner drove Murray’s team nuts by employing time-on-distance runs into the start and then letting his more powerful but less nimble boat talk for him. Different times (inset), as Pelle Petterson is handed his visor by a cig-in-mouth crew during a pre-start in Newport in 1980. The tiller was not a success on heavy but very sensitive 12 Metres
AJAX/ALAMY INSET:PAUL MELLO/OUTSIDE IMAGES
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