Transat Jacques Vabre - An infernal pace for Safran Sailing Team

by Safran Sailing Team on 25 Nov 2013 Transat Jacques Vabre - They’ve done it! At 17hrs 43 minutes and 23 seconds on Sunday, after 17 days 4 hours 43 minutes and 23 seconds of racing, the Safran monohull skippered by Marc Guillemot and Pascal Bidégorry crossed the finishing line in Itajaí (Brazil). At the end of a high speed final stretch, Safran came in ahead of Maître Coq to finish second in the race won by PRB.

Winner in 2009 and second back in 2007, Safran has just achieved another huge success in Brazil. Getting to the podium three times in four races with the same boat is an exceptional performance. It rewards all the work done firstly on the design of the boat, then on her ongoing fine-tuning, and in particular the technological contribution from the many companies within Safran.

Marc Guillemot and Pascal Bidégorry have every right to raise their hands to the sky and congratulate each other with this fantastic second place that they fully deserved. Particularly last night and in the last few miles today when they had to hoist all the sail and 'sail all out like wild men at more than twenty knots with the boat permanently under the water.' Firstly, they had to catch the duo formed by Jérémie Beyou/Christopher Pratt (Maître Coq) who grabbed the advantage once again yesterday evening… then hold them off until they reached the finishing line in Itajaí.

Skilful sailing carried out at a very high average speed: 13.08 knots over the 5450 miles of the theoretical route from Le Havre and 13.93 knots over the 5748 miles they actually sailed out on the water. In comparison, this was around four knots faster than in 2007. Marc Guillemot and Pascal Bidégorry, but also all those, who worked on the boat’s development and on optimising her performance can justifiably be proud of this latest feat.

Once again, Safran has shown that she is the reference boat of the past eight years. On top of that, we should remember that the only IMOCA to have done better in the Transat Jacques Vabre is PRB (Vincent Riou/Jean Le Cam), another boat designed by VPLP-Verdier, built using the same moulds as Safran. But the finest homage concerning this achievement came from Jérémie Beyou a few hours before the end of this Transat Jacques Vabre: the skipper of Maître Coq explained that 'Safran has been fine tuned to perfection. She is a boat that has undergone permanent changes and she has been well sailed by Marco and Pascal, who react perfectly to trim the boat and seize any weather opportunity that comes their way… in other words, they simply sailed well.'

Quotes
Marc Guillemot:
'This was a tough race from start to finish. I have rarely seen such an intense race. With Pascal, we were constantly on the attack. It was a long course. There was no time to ease off even for a second, if you wanted to avoid getting punished immediately. We’re really pleased about finishing second, as we thought it a bit ambitious to aim for the podium, but we fought with determination against some powerful competitors. It’s funny because PRB, the winner is Safran’s little sister (with three years between them): both came out of the same mould. These are both excellent boats. We discovered Safran was able to do some new things. I thought I knew her perfectly, but today I can say that we managed to raise her up a notch. At no point did we fear breaking her. Off Cape Frio we may have been a bit too greedy trying to pull something off, which ended up costing us dearly. We have had a fine battle with Maître Coq since the start of the race. Several times, we found ourselves in sight of each other, which really pushes you forward.'

Pascal Bidégorry:
'I’m happy, of course. Firstly with this fantastic second place, but also simply to finish, as this has been exhausting for us and I’m not against getting a bit of rest. The pace was incredibly intense during these 17 days of racing. We got on well with Marco, but that wasn’t a surprise. On the other hand, I wasn’t expecting it to be so tiring and intense. It was crazy last night: We were sailing at speeds you normally expect from multihulls… 25, 26 and even 27 knots. We were constantly under water with as much sail as possible on the boat. We had to fight hard for this second place. But it was during the race that the pace was infernal. You could even say we didn’t ever have any time to ease off at all.'

In short
Marc Guillemot and Pascal Bidégorry aboard Safran crossed the finishing line of the Transat Jacques Vabre at 16 hrs 43mins 23s (UTC) in Itajaí, in Brazil, or in other words 4 hours 01 min 36 s after the winner, PRB. Their race time: 17d 04h 43min 23s. Their average speed on the theoretical route of 5450 miles from Le Havre was 13.08 knots. They sailed 5748 miles out on the water at an average speed of 13.93 knots.