Transat Jacques Vabre

[Vega]

This is a duo race mostly for Open60's, Openmultihulls (Orma) and Class40 boats.

Big race, 60 pure racing boats on the way.

Weak winds. Safran is ahead with a 6.8k average. First Class 40 is "Télécom Italia", the little brother of Safran (same designer:Verdier / Van Peteghem / Lauriot ) with an average of 6k. Lots of top class40 ahead of the old Open60's.

more here:

http://www.jacques-vabre.com/en/s01_...01p01_home.php

[Pericles]

Vega,

Open 50s rather than 60s, The chart is useful as it's possible to select all the boats and see their position relative to each other.

Mike Golding and Bruno Dubois are fourth in the Imoca Ecover/ The Orma Trimarans are storming, as you would expect! The Open 40s are keeping up.

Pericles

[Chris Ostlind]

Kinda confusing, guys.

There are two types of craft entered... Monos and Trimarans with not one single cat of any kind.

Within those type distinctions, the trimarans are classed as:
Open 60, ORMA designated boats
Class 50 tris

The Monos are classed as:
Open 60 IMOCA class craft
Class 40

Yes, it will be fun to watch as they head on down the eastern reaches of the Atlantic and then across to Brazil, but there's nothing of any merit to report at present as they are all stuck in the confusing elements of the exit from the English Channel and the run south.

The boats are pretty much bunched together with large changes in position and relative placing in their fleets, changing by the hour.

Some of these boats have but very small hours at sea for the crews to fully understand their potential and best trim, while others have been sailing for some time now with all the systems sorted successfully.

Give it a day or two to get al the variables sorted and then you will see real tactics and relational boat comparisons from type to type, as well as length potentials within class.

If the weather routing guys have it correct, expect the multihulls to overtake the monos around Monday? evening, somewhere off the southern coast of Spain/Portugal.

(Monday evening!? what the hell was I thinking when I wrote that day on the post? Whew!, more like Tuesday or something like that. I'm not even sure what week I was in.... help me, please ;-) ) edited on Thursday morning

[Vega]

Originally Posted by Chris Ostlind

Kinda confusing, guys.

There are two types of craft entered... Monos and Trimarans with not one single cat of any kind.

Within those type distinctions, the trimarans are classed as:
Open 60, ORMA designated boats
Class 50 tris

The Monos are classed as:
Open 60 IMOCA class craft
Class 40

Sorry about that. I wanted to say multihulls and I wrote Cats . I am going to edit that on the first post. Thanks .

http://www.jacques-vabre.com/en/s07_...t_skippers.php

[Vega]

Originally Posted by Pericles

Vega,

Open 50s rather than 60s, The chart is useful as it's possible to select all the boats and see their position relative to each other.

Pericles

Chris is right. The 50ft boat are Open multihulls.

But it is very important to take in consideration that they did not start at the same time.

About the monohulls, the first 40class boat is ahead of about 1/3 of the Open60s (6 behind) and that is awesome taking in consideration the huge difference in size, price and technology (canting-keels and materials).
That's great but only possible on light winds.

[Vega]

Another interesting fact is that these races, once a French affair, are becoming more and more international races.

This one has 37 non-French sailors.

They came from Belgium, England, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Australia, USA, Canadá, South Africa, Swiss and Chile and many of them are professionals.

[Vega]

The big trimarans are closing on, sailing at a little bit over 20k. Gitana has lost the lead and Groupama shows the way, followed by Banque populaire.

The leading Open 60’s pack is making about 19k . Safran had lost most of its advance on a bold movement offshore, while Foncia (Farr) and Ecoever (Owen and Clarke) are closing in.

On the 40class, Fujifilm, an all British boat and a brand new one (Owen and Clarke) is closing on the leader (making 10k).

On the monohulls the new Owen and Clarke and Verdier / Van Peteghem / Lauriot boats are doing great.

About the last ones, it is an unusual combination. Peteghem and Lauriot are very good multihull designers but without experience on monohull racing boats:


“Van Peteghem Lauriot Prévost and Guillaume Verdier are collaborating on a new IMOCA 60’ monohull for Marc Guillemot who has his sites set on the Vendée Globe 2008.
VPLP has more then 20 years experience in designing racing and record breaking trimarans, and Guillaume Verdier, formerly with Groupe Finot, is an expert in 60’Imoca monohulls, and has already applied his talents to teams such as Mediatis Région Aquitaine and AREVA Challenge for the next Americas cup. ......

This project is interesting on three levels:

On the one hand, it is the result of a collaboration which results in a well balanced association between two different naval architecture firms with very different backgrounds. This allows us to share our individual design experiences and each bring a fresh perspective to the project leading to innovative ideas and creative solutions.

On the other hand it is collaboration with a very elite technological sponsor (Safran made up of SAGEM and SNECMA . SNECMA creates motorisation parts for the aeronautic and aero spatial industry). Because of the compatibility between the sailing project and the sponsors core capability, we are given the means to explore and understand our conceptual approach in great detail by rigorous research and judicious back up. Without being too interfering, the sponsor consistently forms a parallel between their architectural design practices and ours. It is a dynamic spiral of cross pollinisation!

Finally our intimate collaboration with Marc Guillemot and his team, particularly, Thierry Brault, Erwan Conan, Loic Lingois et Patrick Julien, who help us to weigh up the trade offs and make key decisions. We form a well soldered team who collaborate efficiently.”

http://www.vplp.fr/flash/index_vplp-3.html

[Vega]

As you know 40class boats were born in France. Most of the boats have French sailors, but the first big race (La route du Rhum) was won by a British and on this one the Italians are leading, almost from the beginning. I believe that there are a lot of pissed French sailors.

[Pericles]

Vraiment, truly vraiment! Nom de chein!!! Fifi

Pericles

[Vega]

Originally Posted by Chris Ostlind

Kinda confusing, guys.
If the weather routing guys have it correct, expect the multihulls to overtake the monos around Monday evening, somewhere off the southern coast of Spain/Portugal.

With weak winds the sailing potential of the Trimarans, compared with the Open60 is huge. They departed 24 hours later, overtake the monohulls and the leading one is already at the Canaries, while the best Open60 is passing Madeira. I guess that with weak winds and fair weather they should have waited 2 or 3 days, to finish at the about the same time .

[DGreenwood]

A fantastic battle shaking down among the expected front runners. This is some crazy close racing. I had my eye on the Safran and Groupe Bel design(same mold I think). Love that design. Very simple.

This could get really good, although the doldrums could spread them out again ;?(

[Vega]

Originally Posted by Pericles

I would love to have a Gunboat 66, when and if the next Jacques Varbre takes place and shadow the leading ORMA, probably Groupama 2, all the way to Bahia, Brazil and about a few miles from the finishing line, let the Gunboat have its head and surge past the trimaran, to take line honours, whilst having a good meal at the table and glugging the Bolly.

It's an eleven day passage, hardly time to get used to being at sea and the vessel would be on autopilot for 90% of the voyage. The helm is a joystick.

Some may argue that the Gunboat 66 will not have the speed, but a heavier Gunboat 62 has exceeded 36 knots. I'd be delighted to give it a go.

….

Am I dreaming? Absolutely!

Pericles

I hope you don’t mind that I reply here.

Yes you are dreaming. There is an incredible huge difference between a fast cruising cat like Gunboat 66 and a top racing trimaran like Gruparama. It’s like to say that a Ferrari F50 can be a match for a F1. Fact is that a simple racing formula ford, with be faster on a track.

Even an Open60 would be faster than the Gunboat. The Gunboat can make 36k? An Open60 also, even more. What counts is the wind needed to go fast.

If the conditions were very bad, as had happened on other races, you would see that the difference between the trimarans and the Open60’s would be a lot smaller and that the trimarans would experience a lot more retirements from the race than the monohulls (breaking, capsizing).

I like both types of boats, but we have to be fair regarding the strong and week points of each one and to see the diference between top racing boats and fast cruising ones.

Regards

[Vega]

Originally Posted by DGreenwood

This is some crazy close racing. I had my eye on the Safran and Groupe Bel design(same mold I think). Love that design. Very simple.

People seem to believe that Open60's are very similar boats. That is not true; there are big differences between the boats, in weight, sail area, size of the mast and even beam. They are Open, that means you may explore a lot of variables. I have collected some interesting information about those differences, when I have more time I will post then on the Open60's thread.

The Safran is one of Open60's that carries less sail .

[DGreenwood]

Originally Posted by Vega

The Safran is one of Open60's that carries less sail .

Thus my interest...Safran and Groupe Bel have same hull with very different rigs. They are sailing in similar conditions. It is a good opportunity to compare.

[Vega]

Originally Posted by DGreenwood

Thus my interest...Safran and Groupe Bel have same hull with very different rigs. They are sailing in similar conditions. It is a good opportunity to compare.

Yes, I will not forget, but I had been busy