Transat Jacques Vabre – Alex Thomson - trialling the new Hugo Boss

by Transat Jacques Vabre on 23 Oct 2015 The Transat Jacques Vabre is a very special race for Alex Thomson. Le Havre’s docks are really where Alex started out the IMOCA class back in 1999 as a fresh faced youngster, lining up alongside Josh Hall on Gartmore and finishing seventh on the monohull class in 23 days, average speed 7.95 kts.

Twelve years later, after a chapter of bitter disappointments including two Vendée Globe retirements, it was on the 2011 race, following a back to basics approach with an older, reliable Farr design, that he finished in second place, sailing a fantastic race with Spain’s Guillermo Altadill. Altadill was the catalyst to their choice to put reliability ahead of constantly seeking a silver bullet and the recipe worked. To a great extent the 2011 Transat Jacque Vabre got the money off Thomson’s back as they delivered a crucial podium which was to be the foundation of his third place in the last Vendée Globe.

Now Thomson is back. He has an extremely sexy, potent looking new VPLP/Verdier design, the latest Hugo Boss which most consider to be the most radical of the new foil assisted designs.

But while the new, back in black, design clearly has huge potential it is completely unproven. He confirms the boat is three months behind where they wanted to be. They have only just got to their ‘drop dead’ date, to be ready for this race. And so, he says, hopes, expectations, aspirations are pretty much iced for the moment. His objective is now to learn the boat, to get to Itajaí and take stock of what they have assimilated. But, he notes, ‘Guillermo and I are both highly competitive’……..

“The boat is good for the eight days of sailing we have done.” Thomson opens,

“The boat is three months late so we had hoped obviously to have been in the water and to have learned a lot more and to be in a similar place to where Gitana and Banque Populaire are.”

“So now I think now for us it's about finishing it. We will just try and get to the finish and at the end of this race start being able to think about performance rather than just getting the boat in the water and making it reliable.”

As with others of the new breed of IMOCAs, Thomson’s team have had their problems which have hobbled their progress:

“We've had several problems, we had to add some structure around the board cases. Between the bearings water would come in, so that's been strengthened.

Our first set of boards were a problem, there were quite a few voids in the laminate. We actually cracked one of them so this is our second set of boards and they have been in the boat for a week but they had to go back to the factory twice for some extra little bits and bobs.”

He remains objective and relatively relaxed about where they are…

“We know what we know but we don't know what we don't know. And now we have to find out and the best way to find out is to come and do some racing and put the boat under some pressure. In terms of performance, currently we don't even have a set of Polars (ed: coptimum target speeds and wind angles) so we don't really know how the boat performs. Our calibration was finalised on the way over here, so it's about trying to understand how the boat performs and trying to understand how to make it go a bit faster and then feed that information back so that we can start thinking about where we we're going from there.”

Their strategy was always to be as late as possible in the cycle, seeking to learn from what others have already optimised and developed, in theory following the view taken by Francois Gabart, Mer Agitée and the MACIF programme leading up to their Vendee Globe win.

“Overall though it's good because we don't have any expectations at all. If we can just get to the finish then for me that would be a success. The priority is the Vendeé Globe and trying to understand how our foil system works and if it works and how we might take that forward for the future, whether in January we are cutting it all out and sticking it straight boards or what, we don't know.”

“ We were the last boat off the drawing board. So there's six new boats and their designs. If you remember MACIF four years ago she was here with an army working on the boat and then she came fourth and then Francoise won the B2B and then won every race since. For us that was the ideal programme for sure but we still would have liked to have been three months earlier. Our drop dead date was we had to be in this race to be able to understand and learn and put the boat under miles we had to do this race.”

Hugo Boss is a narrower hull with foils designed to maximise lift and get the boat out of the water more.

“Quite early on we decided we thought the foils would work and so we chose to be a bit narrower than everybody else, under the assumption that the foils will provide some stability. You don't need to have as much boat in the water and driving the boat narrower means that you end up with a lighter boat, lighter bulb and so overall you are a lighter package. We pushed really hard to try and take the weight down as much as possible so hence the really deep cockpit and the guys have done a great job with that.”

But that slightly more extreme brief is tempered by simple, solid learnings from his and his team’s long experience now:

“It's a good setup from the learnings we have had and the boats we have sailed over the years. We've got a lot of experience in our team now. So we tried to make simple choices for instance in some areas. Like, the charging systems where you could save a few kilos but take some risks, we just decided to stay with what we know, what's reliable and what has worked”

The relationship between the two is now mature and developed, they work perfectly together and feed off each others enthusiasm. As Altadill notes, they have nothing to prove to the world,

Altadill: “The last time when we did this race there was no pressure at all so we all started at the same time as us with a really able boat. It had been sailed before but there was no pressure at all. I think when you are sailing at this level, less pressure is better. So we don't have any pressure. We only have to keep the boat in one piece, push the boat a little each day a little bit more as we get more confident and arrive in Brazil.”

Alex: Guillermo has been with our team though since we started four years ago, so when we were making the choices of boats and designers and looking at types of foiling boats we did some stuff together.

Thomson adds:

“We have sailed together, our first ever Jacques Vabre was 2011 and the Fastnet before that and he has been with us pretty much ever since and we don't know why it works but it works. It's a partnership so we are constantly feeding how we are thinking to each other and it's that communication process that is really important because it's how you interpret it. That's what's important, the messages we give each other are interpreted it the way it was intended. The difference with us now and 2011 is that we're really good friends, much more now than ever before. Guillermo has been pretty much living in Gosport. We have fun together, we got drunk at my daughters christening last week. I would choose to sail with him because we work so well together and we get on and we have fun.

'I know him well enough that when he's grumpy I can tell him [to sort himself out].'

Guillermo counters: “Normally he is not grumpy, he is too optimistic and I have to change his mind a bit sometimes.

Thomson:
“ Because Guillermo has been with us for a long time and was instrumental in us changing our boat for the last Vendeé, as well as a co-skipper, he is a coach and he just keeps the team in the right direction.

And as far as the weather prospects for the race go he concludes:
“The weather is changing all the time but right now if we had to sail into a low pressure in 50 to 55 knots of wind today we wouldn't do it. We're not ready for that, it would be professional suicide.”

The 2015 Transat Jacques Vabre fleet is complete

After a delivery which was delayed by the threat of Hurricane Joaquin O Canada arrived in Le Havre in the early hours of this morning after starting their delivery on October 6th. Eric Holden and Morgan Watson sailed with a total crew of eight on the boat which is the former Spirit of Canada, designed by Owen Clarke, which raced the 2008 Vendée Globe.
Skipper Holden is looking to compete in the next Vendée Globe and admits this Transat Jacques Vabre is very much a key stage of the learning curve for him. The duo raced together as part of the winning crew on the 2013-14 Clipper Round the World Race. Holden is an accomplished meteorologist who worked as the Canadian Sailing Team’s meteorologist at the 2012 Olympic Games.
Looking tired and relieved, but ready to take on the next stage of his challenge, Holden said this morning:

“ We got so delayed by the hurricane that in the end we had to leave. We ended up leaving a week behind schedule but rather than take the risk of leaving ahead of the hurricane and have it pass over us then, but it really set us back in terms of our preparation. Rather than being one of the first ehre we ended up being last, by a long shot. So it is going to be a pretty busy three days to get things turned around. We had no major damage on the way across and saw 40kts. So it does prove the boat is sound and ready. We have done a Transat in preparation before doing a Transat race. So in some ways it is probably good for our preparation.”

“ We don’t have much to do with the boat. We have our wind wand to replace and some carbon work at the top. We tore a delivery sail. But the race has not been raced in the IMOCA class since the 2008 Vendée Globe. So today we have some last minute class requirements to fulfil.
This is really last minute for us. A couple of months ago we did not have the funds to do this. We did not know if we could or would make it, but it is great to be here. We are the oldest boat in the fleet. We are the least funded boat in the fleet. Expectations are not high but for me it is all about learning for the Vendée Globe. I have not paid my deposit yet but that is the goal.”

“ As a duo? Morgan sailed as my watch leader on the Clipper Round the World Race, that was fully crewed. And also we took the boat from Vancouver (west coast Canada) through the Panama Canal up to the East Coast and so we have 15,000 miles on this boat. But two up we just have our qualifying passage. It will be a baptism of fire, definitely. But better to learn with two, than one!

And of course with the arrival of O Canada the Transat Jacques Vabre fleet is complete.

Following the start of the 2015 Transat Jacques Vabre
Falling, as it usually does, during the schools’ mid term break in Northern Europe, a visit to the start of the Transat Jacques Vabre has proven an enjoyable, instructive and exciting experience for sailing fans and non-sailing visitors for many past editions. Le Havre is easily accessible by cross-channel ferry, by public transport from Paris and by road. And for spectators on start day, all of the emotion and drama of the morning dockout is freely visible from the ‘pit lane’ just a few metres from the race boats, the skippers, teams and families. There are dozens of good vantage points after the racers slip their lines and move through the dock area and pass the bridge out to the open sea. Thereafter the start is in front of the beach and, weather permitting, there is a short loop which allows spectators to get a view of the departing fleet.

On Sunday at 1330hrs, the starting gun for the 12th Transat Jacques Vabre will be fired off the la Hève headland near Le Havre. The 42 boats (14 Class40s, 4 Multi50s, 20 Imoca 60s and 4 Ultimes) will set off to sail on a crazy 5400 mile race course across the Atlantic to Itajaí. But before pointing their bows towards Brazil, the fleet will have to round the Seine-Maritime course mark off Etretat. Here’s how you can follow the start from ashore and in the media…

Le Havre

Paul Vatine harbour basin: things will come to life early on Sunday morning with the boats casting off from 0630hrs. Macif will be the first to leave followed by the other three Ultime multihulls. Then, it will be the turn of the Imoca 60s, including Adopteunskipper.net, which will be last to drop their lines. Following that at 0745hrs, the Multi50s and Class40s will set off, with the last to cast off, V and B at 8h20.

Harbourside: from the Abeilles quay, at the foot of the lookout, there will be plenty to see! The boats will have to pass between the harbour wall and a black buoy allowing the public to get a close look at the all. The fleet can also be seen from the Augustin Normand harbour wall.

Beaches and cliffs: the 1.6 mile long start line will be set up off the la Hève headland. So, it can be seen from the beaches in Le Havre and Saint Adresse. The car park at the Bout du Monde will offer an excellent view of the start line. The fleet will then head for Etretat, which is 16 miles from the start line.

Etretat

Beaches and cliffs: two marker buoys that have to be rounded will be positioned500m off the cliffs, which should enable spectators to get a good view of the boats from the cliff-top locations or down on the pebble beaches.

In brief….

Francois Gabart, ‘Learning the Boat’
Francois Gabart sails his first race with his giant VPLP trimaran MACIF, racing with Pascal Bidégorry. The 30m VPLP design only had its first sail on 22nd August and is very early in its development. Gabart confirmed yesterday: “The priority is going to be discovering the boat, making sure she is reliable, gaining experience and completing the race. The goal isn’t to win, but to fine tune the trimaran. Even if we are still in the discovery phase, we can perform well. Pascal and I are born competitors. We know that we have a fast boat and we don’t intend to slow down. This year we are launching the boat and developing her, so that she can get better and better for the race programme lined up for the next five years.”

Jean Pierre Dick…..the finest Transat Jacques Vabre for the IMOCA
Jean Pierre Dick will start Sunday with the possibility of becoming the first skipper to win the Transat Jacques Vabre for a fourth time. Jean Pierre, with a reputation as something of a double handed expert having also won the Barcelona World Race, won his first Transat Jacques Vabre in 2003 with Nicolas Abiven. He triumphed again in 2005 with Loick Peyron and into Puerto Limon, Costa Rica in 2011 with Jérémie Beyou. His new St Michel-Virbac was only recently launched, on 12th September, and preparation time has been limited. He sails with Fabien Delahaye who won the Class 40 in the last race on GDF Suez with Sébastien Rogues. Dick says this is the best IMOCA line up yet…..

“As for the line up of racers in the IMOCA category, this is the finest Transat Jacques Vabre if we look at the number of boats and the quality of the skippers. The standard is indeed very high. We are going to have to get into the pace of the race from the outset. Our crew with Fabien (Delahaye) works well. We are up there with the best, so the idea is to find the best trajectories. It’s also going to be a test for many of us, who haven’t yet sailed that much on our new boats. This is an important race.”