Francis Joyon and the IDEC team depart in their attempt to claim Jules Verne Trophy

After some fairly soft conditions over the last day or two the IDEC team have crossed the Equator in a time of 35 days 4 hours and 4 minutes setting a new record. The previous record has been improved by 2 days, 22 hours and 36 minutes

http://www.idecsport-sailing.com/new-equator-record-for-idec-sport/?lang=en

 

The IDEC team have a rough eta of Thursday morning, their latest press release: http://www.idecsport-sailing.com/idec-sport-expected-in-brest-on-thursday/?lang=en

 

At 7 am french time, 800 miles to go doing 31.1 knots of vmg.

 

The latest English press release, the final 24 hours: http://www.idecsport-sailing.com/the-final-24-hours/?lang=en

 

Another press release it now looks like they will come in at under 41 days.

http://www.idecsport-sailing.com/idec-sport-expected-at-first-light-on-thursday/?lang=en

The averages are impressive with a 24 hour average of 31.7 knots and an instant speed of 35.4 knots with about 366nm to go. The weather conditions have allowed a much more direct course to be sailed towards the finish.

 

According to the tracker the IDEC crew are 16.9nm from the finish with 22 knots boat speed. It looks like they will just slide in at under 41 days.

http://www.idecsport-sailing.com/live-map/?lang=en

 

According to the tracker they have just finished with a time of approximately 40 days 23 hours and 33 minutes. Congratulations to Francis Joyon and the IDEC team.

p.s. the official time from the IDEC team was 40 days, 23 hours and 30 minutes with an average speed of 26.9 knots over 26,412nm.

live video streaming of the arrival on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/user/FrancisJoyon/live

 

Wow, it sure doesn't take 80 days any more!

 

The option of of lightness and simplicity payed; reasonable trimaran, small rig, small crew. With the small rig the safety has been greatly improved with no real loss of mean speed.
An 10% improvement on the time of the record is remarkable. But it's also the result of a clever navigation and routing plus a bit of luck.
"Total distance actually sailed: 26,412 miles, in comparison to Banque Populaire V’s 29,002 miles" That means that the "small" tri obtained a similar average speed to the big one (Banque Populaire V) but probably having a better angle of sail center and more stability , a more direct route has been possible. Having almost 10% miles less to sail, IDEC SPORT got the record.
Oceanic racing asks for very deep and detailed analysis, beyond the easy way of the biggest, the fastest, etc...Compared to Banque Populaire a big Ferrarri, Idec looks at first sight almost a moped.

 

The 10% reduction on sailed distance comes mainly from 2 legs:
- the north Atlantic returning, where BPV had to make a very big turn around the Azores high while IDECsport got an almost straight line at quite high speed once out of the doldrums because of a low sweeping the high;
- the southern ocean where the wheather and ice situation allowed IDEC to ride a low for almost 10 days, while BPV had to chase the wind a lot more and also had to avoid icebergs.

In the south speed was that of the low, so BPV would have done more or less the same as IDEC did, but in the north IDEC had to slow down due to the sea state. There BPV could probably keep a slightly higer pace because of the extra length.

 

Regarding the sluggish transition of the south atlantic, another few days less seem possible, making an overall of 3x days.
But as said before, it is mainly a lottery on the weather conditions and a forecast in routing quality for almost 40 days is still far beyond the abilities of meteorological science, so it stays for quite a while this way.

 

Idec

What a great effort!

 

All of you have your points. With meteo, you need luck. But it remains that the smaller, lighter and "easier" (the NA called it the mobylette -the moped-) trimaran has made a very similar mean speed.

And I maintain that the "small" rig with its slightly better efficiency has permitted a more direct route. In a short regatta, or a moderate wind race in Atlantic, such a rig does not pay on a so smaller boat.
But in the hard south seas, the rig payed with a good interest rate. Remark that Idec arrived to Good Hope Cape about 700 miles behind Banque Populaire, but after it began to break the partial records one after another. The meteo conditions do not explain totally such a metronome regularity over so long distances.

The 2 tris have a huge difference in size and sail surface.
BPV is has far more sail and it's lighter in ratio displacement/length while the widths are pretty close with far longer hulls.
IDEC has a far better ratio stability/sail surface and can keep the sail longer with less stresses on the amas as the rig is shorter and lighter. Probably it's more robust and it can be pressed harder.

The ciphers speak by themselves. IDEC is a "small" maxi tri compared to BPV. I leave to you the pleasure of calculating the static ratios. There are other very interesting dynamic ratios, mainly in diagonal stability and damping curves.

Architects for both tris : VPLP team (Van Péteghem-Lauriot Prévost)

IDEC SPORT BPV
Length: 31.50 m 40 m
Beam: 22.50 m 23 m
Displacement: 18,000 kg 23.000 kg
Draught: 5.70 m 5,80 m
Mast height: 33.50 m 47 m

Upwind sail surface: 411 m2 713 m2
Downwind sail surface: 678 m2 1050 m2

 

Sometimes less is more! This is a good idea for cruisers as well. It tends to get lost in pile it on marketing.

 

It will be interesting to watch the Spindrift teams next Jules Verne Trophy attempt on Spindrift 2. The boat is no longer in the same configuration as BPV with a new reengineered and shorter mast combined with a smaller crew requirement and other optimisations. If the weather cooperates it should be a faster platform than IDEC. Spindrift 2 is much better suited to keeping high averages when the seastate is unfavorable than IDEC.

It's nice to see Francis Joyon and his team nail the record and a bit of glory and celebration is in order for them plus some well earned rest.