12th edition of Transat Jacques Vabre: 8 Tris (Multi50 & Maxis) started on Sunday

[Skip JayR]

On a sunny Sunday front Le Havre (France) a beautifulyl spectacle with 42 boats (totally) on the start line...

12th edition of TJV (Transat Jacques Vabre): 8 Trimarans (Multi50 & Maxis) started on 25th Oct racing along the “Route du Café” (~5,400 miles)

Can the "old Multi 50" beat the new IMOCAs ?? - After eight hours sailing it didn't look so bad for the 3-hull boats as shown by the 24hx7d live tracker...

The Maxi Tris...



Tracked Multi50 Trimarans ~30 nm behind the Maxis...

[Skip JayR]

My own statement (or at least what I recognize by my own senses):

The "status quo" of the TJV after first 27 hours speaks drastically for multihulls - either in the cruising or racing world. (Rec.: You can follow on your own tge live tracker here using your browser.)


We clearly can see the heavily lack of (pimped) monohulls. - The newly designed IMOCAs of bigger size (60 ft.) with foil tuning cant compete against the smaller Multihulls of "only" 50 feet.

What counts is the size and the boat type which are clustered for the TJV as following.

• Class 40... ~12 meters LOA... average speed 11 knots
• IMOCA (open 60)... ~18 meters LOA... average speed 14-15 knots
• Multi50 (one design Trimarans).... ~15 meters LOA... average speed 15-16 knots
• Maxi Trimarans (open design 90-110 ft.)... ~24-31 meters LOA... average speed 18-19 knots

Here we remember, that the average age of the "old Multi50s" is 6 years, being built around 2009.... while the leader of the IMOCA fleet is still behind. It is Alex Thomson with his brand new and with foils highly tuned BOSS boat (couple of weeks ago launched). It is the black boat in the screenshot of the "live tracker".

The Class 40 (the bulk of boats on top of the tracker picture) falls into the trap of a very low depression which was announced within the meteo consulting/briefing already on Saturday...


The slower 40 footers (just 3 knots slower than the IMOCAs and 4-5 knots slower than the Multi50s) have to sail W-WNW course directly into the centre of the low depression- Instead: the target is Brazilian coast so they should head down to South to find back to the ideal course (the white-grey line in the tracker picture).

The fastest Maxi Tris Sodebo and Macif (you can see on the bottom of the tracker screenshot) - by their speed potentials - get the chance to hunt easily way.

The benefit is easily to be understood: More leight weighted = bigger speed, more safely the journey... same rule for a "cruising multihull" in comparison to "bigger monohulls". No difference as the physical principles are the same.

So don't think, that it doesn't count to have 2-3 knots higher speed during long distance sailing (as cruisers). Its worth to keep a cruising catamaran/trimaran leight weighted for getting the essential benefit to keep the boat + crew on the safe side of "bad weather"...

Happy & Safe Sailing !
----
P.S.: Read on to see how the Monday night became a really bad day of TJV2015 having lost intotally more than 5% of all participants.

[Skip JayR]

In the world of ocean sailing mostly bad news must be seen as bad news... the Monday as first day became the first bad day for the 12th edition of Transat Jacques Vabre...

Early morning the first IMOCA 60 Footer "Maitre CoQ " had to abandon the race...
Maitre CoQ Retire | Transat Jacques Vabre 2015 : Le Havre - Itajai | October 2015 | Take to the seas and act for the planet


Early evening the 2nd IMOCA quit the race in bad weather conditions... as to read about the Team Gitana (Edmund de Rothschild) from the TJV website:

At 1900hrs this Monday afternoon the Edmond de Rothschild co-skippers contacted Cyril Dardashti, the manager of the Gitana team, to say they would like to retire from the race which is heading to Itajaí, Brasil.
Sébastien Josse explained the reasons:

“Since the afternoon we had a series of incidents aboard Edmond de Rothschild. Taken individually these problems are quite minor and if we had better weather we could probably put them right. But all added up to one another and given the weather conditions we see these incidents as potentially endangering us and the boat. The weather files show more than 40kts of wind at times and seven metre seas. Charles and I consider it would not be responsible to carry on in these conditions. The boat was only launched two and a half months ago, and despite all the work which was done by the Gitana team to optimises and be ready is so short a time, these are problems associated with a recently launched boat. The decision to abandon was a very hard one but we do not want to jeopardise more than a year of hard work. The boat was designed for the Vendée Globe and that remains the major objective of the team. It is hard to retire but we must not lose sight of that as the goal.”

Late night then came in the next bad news via Sailing Scuttlebutt of capsizing one of the Maxi Trimarans...

The 76-foot trimaran Prince de Bretagne of Lionel Lemonchois and Roland Jourdain has capsized while they were 140 miles off La Coruna. The two co-skippers are safe and have taken shelter inside the trimaran. They have not requested assistance and their technical team is making every effort to organise help to rescue them and their vessel. At the time of the incident the boat was upwind in 20 to 25kts of SSW’ly wind.

It was confirmed by the TJV HQ...
Prince de Bretagne Capsize, Skippers safe | Transat Jacques Vabre 2015 : Le Havre - Itajai | October 2015 | Take to the seas and act for the planet


At least: it seemed the crew (Lionel Lemonchois and Roland Jourdain) was safely inside the boat drifting functionally as unsinkable "life raft", not yet seen as an emergency case. Very pitty. I like Roland J. a lot... he is an inspiration.

Not enough... 2 other monohulls have abandoned too beside the IMOCA 60 footers. It was published shortly after midnight on Sail World....
http://www.sail-world.com/Transat-Ja...apsizes/139528

Who want get such news at Tuesday 02:00 am CET ???

Safran (another IMOCA60) and Team Concise (Class 40) abandoned too.

Safran turned 180 degree course and sailed back to French Coast/Brest...
Damage on Safran, heading to Brest | Transat Jacques Vabre 2015 : Le Havre - Itajai | October 2015 | Take to the seas and act for the planet


...and Consise headed to Northern Cork on Irish coast.
Class 40 Team Concise head to Cork, Ireland with damage | Transat Jacques Vabre 2015 : Le Havre - Itajai | October 2015 | Take to the seas and act for the planet



The low depression hit the fleet heavily, so it seemed... as it was announced in the Meteo Briefing on Saturday.

So in total now 5 boats out of the race... thats more than 10% within first 30 hours. Really a bad quote.

Let's hope for the best that we can see the 38 boats in the race and their crews arriving safely on Brazil Coast in November.

[Skip JayR]

Nearby unnoticed from internationally sailing community as the short notice only appeared on the "French News Version" of TJV website:

Club 103 (Alan Roura/Juliette Pêtrès) se déroute sur Lorient | Transat Jacques Vabre 2015 : Le Havre - Itajai | Octobre 2015

Not yet clear, if Club103 can come back into the race after repairings in Lorient...

[donradcliffe]

I haven't heard any updates since the IMOCA's blew past the Multi 50's...

43 entries, 34 still racing, but only the multi's have needed outside assistance so far.

[Skip JayR]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I haven't heard any updates since the IMOCA's blew past the Multi 50's...

43 entries, 34 still racing, but only the multi's have needed outside assistance so far.

Hi, Donradcliffe ! .. you are the first one of CF forum who shows interests. So I gave it up to update here as there was "0" response.

Freel free to come over to the Multihull subdivsion of BoatDesign Forum.... there we keep all updated with same thread "headline"...

You can take a look there without registrating:
12th edition of Transat Jacques Vabre: 8 Tris (Multi50 & Maxis) started on Sunday - Boat Design Forums

Seems here in CF there are 99.99% only "coffee sailing cruisers"... hehe... no interests for racing, hm ? :-) Lazy folks...

[Factor]

Hi skip - I am very interested and was following it but stuffed if I will get involved in a thread where the first input is about how only the multis needed outside assistance, I am so over that discussion.

[Skip JayR]

Originally Posted by Factor

Hi skip - I am very interested and was following it but stuffed if I will get involved in a thread where the first input is about how only the multis needed outside assistance, I am so over that discussion.

hm.... what do you mean with "outside assistance" ? Three of 4 Multi50s are still in... "La French Tech Rennes Saint Malo" had to abandon.

One Maxi capsized.... and yesterday Maxi Tri Actual abandoned because of some heavily structural damages of the Canting Mast system...



Now its only a duel between Sodebo and Macif far front the whole fleet...

That some of us like to look at the IMOCAs and Multi50 is a natural thing, isnt ? - I address this aspect as I think about the future of "middle sized racing Trimarans" in the range of 50-70 ft (Multi50, Orma60, Mod70), generally.

If the Multi50 won't demonstrate a good performance against the IMOCAs in the TJV2015 I have my doubt that they will have a positive future. Just my personal opinion :-)

The live tracker shows, that leading Mluti50 Tri Ciela Village has a distance to arrival now 3894.50 nm at a speed of 19.6 knots, the leading IMOCA Banque Populaire VII has 3,635 nm at a speed of 15.3 knots.

Let see... maybe the Multi50s can speed up in lighter winds.

[44'cruisingcat]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I haven't heard any updates since the IMOCA's blew past the Multi 50's...

43 entries, 34 still racing, but only the multi's have needed outside assistance so far.

Oh really?

[Factor]

Originally Posted by Skip JayR

hm.... what do you mean with "outside assistance" .

Hi Skip

I mean this comment

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I haven't heard any updates since the IMOCA's blew past the Multi 50's...

43 entries, 34 still racing, but only the multi's have needed outside assistance so far.

For the record, Hugo Boss is now sinking and its crew did the EPIRB and Rescue thing.

I don't criticise them, I don't use their experience to indicate all mono's are crap, this is Grand Prix racing, construction and sailing are right on the edge. I am deeply surprised when all the boats, mono or multi, finish one of these things.

Alex Thomson and Guillermo Altadill, skippers of yacht HUGO BOSS in the Transat Jacques Vabre set off their emergency beacon this afternoon at 13.25UT. The Spanish Coastguard was informed and sent a rescue helicopter to their location 82 nautical miles from the Spanish coast. Both Alex and Guillermo were rescued from the location by helicopter and are on their way back to land.

HUGO BOSS incurred some structural damage earlier this week forcing Alex and Guillermo to stop racing. The Skippers had made a repair and were on route to A Coruna where the technical team were waiting to meet them. After sailing for a period of 36 hours in high seas and strong winds, the structure of the boat deteriorated further and the boat started to take on water and sink. The technical team are in A Coruna, Spain awaiting further information from the coast guard.

[44'cruisingcat]

Originally Posted by Factor

Hi Skip

I mean this comment



For the record, Hugo Boss is now sinking and its crew did the EPIRB and Rescue thing.

I don't criticise them, I don't use their experience to indicate all mono's are crap, this is Grand Prix racing, construction and sailing are right on the edge. I am deeply surprised when all the boats, mono or multi, finish one of these things.

Exactly. These boats are built as light as possible, and sailed right to the limit. It should be expected that things will go wrong at times.

Sure you could build boats and sail them so they'd finish every time. But you wouldn't win many races. These guys are racing to win.

For some reason, some people feel they need to take every possible opportunity to take a shot at multihulls.

[Rustic Charm]

Yep, heard on this mornings news that Hugo Boss has been abandoned ? Must have been catastrophic failure.

[barnakiel]

Is Hugo jinxed? I mean was. This boat and skipper combo has probably maxed out the fail to sail ratio.

And is Spirit of Hungary a heavy pig? Why are they always late, delaminated and so slow? I mean were. Dismasted too, now.

Some teams have a long and winding learning curve ;-)

PS Most entertained now watching the Sodebo and Macif sniffing for an ITCZ gate.

PS2 Meanwhile the Mini Transat took off from Lanzarote today. I watched the leading boat flying at 20 knots (sic!) while some marauders inched at less than 9! All in the same wind-field.

PS3 It looks like the boat claimed to never sail by the Forum will win the Mini Transat again. No?

b.

[barnakiel]

I think this may be their last sponsorship for Safran too. A military technology company and always breaking up. So much for the navy. Stay civil! ;-)

Then again I think their ex is somewhere close to the head of the division right now.

b.

[Rustic Charm]

I'm not sure if this will come across as it's off facebook. A video of their rescue.

https://www.facebook.com/salvamentom...es/?fref=photo