As the thirteenth week of the Vendée Globe draws to a close – following the retirement of Arnaud Boissières, 11 sailors remain at sea on Friday – Tip & Shaft spoke to the president of the Imoca class, Antoine Mermod, who shares his views on the tenth edition of the race.
What has struck you about the recent wave of arrivals?
What struck me was that this edition confirmed that the Vendée Globe is an extraordinary catalyst of emotions. For three months, we’ve vibrated to the rhythm of the adventures, adventures, successes and doubts of the skippers, and when you follow the finishes, you can really see all the emotion on their faces and in their words, which makes this challenge so unique.
And what did you learn from them?
The main point to emerge was that, more than ever, this edition was a global regatta. All the skippers outdid each other in sporting terms, not just the top 3. There was fighting at every level, as we saw again at the start of the week, with the 16-minute gap between Benjamin Ferré and Tanguy Le Turquais, and the six boats that were battling it out right to the end for 15th place. As far as I’m concerned, the high level of reliability allowed the skippers to express themselves in sporting terms, and we had less of a technical elimination race. All this can be explained by the quality of the preparation, by the skippers and their teams, and by the qualification system which, over a three-year period, made the boats reliable and enabled the skippers to get the measure of them. At the start of the Vendée Globe, the vast majority of the fleet was very well prepared, as had never been the case before.
Does this mean that racing has taken precedence over adventure?
No, I don’t agree with that. For me, first and foremost, a solo round-the-world race is an extraordinary adventure. If you look at Yannick Bestaven, who won four years ago, he was battling it out in the top 10 for two-thirds of the race, had to stop and abandon at Cape Horn, only to set off again and finish out of the race, it was an extraordinary adventure, whereas he was a skipper playing for the podium. So I dont’ want to oppose the two.
“The Vendée Globe does not
need several classifications”
Are you surprised by the times set by the frontrunners, and what conclusions can you draw from them?
To be perfectly frank, no. If we look at the intrinsic performance of the boats, those of the 2016 generation [date of Armel Le Cléac’h’s previous record, in just over 74 days, editor’s note] were doing between 420 and 490 miles in 24 hours in favorable conditions, with a record of 530. Here, clearly, before the start, we could see that in equal conditions, they were doing between 520 and 580, with a top speed of 600 or even more. So we knew that the potential gain was in the order of 10 to 15%, which proved to be the case, bearing in mind that in addition, on this edition, the frontrunners had the right weather sequence, with all the green lights coming on as they went along. And in the south, the boats are now able to adopt multihull attitudes and strategies that enable them to position themselves in relation to the systems and increase their chances of having a positive weather sequence.
Jean Le Cam recently said in an interview with Le Monde that he was surprised by the pace set by some foilers in the windy conditions of the south, were you?
Not necessarily. For me, the turning point was The Ocean Race two years ago, including the leg around Antarctica. It’s interesting to note that 11 of the 40 skippers at the start of the Vendée Globe raced this leg, including many of the leaders. The fact that they went to the South, where you never go outside the Vendée Globe, with the same boats, basically gave them certainty about what the Imoca boats could handle, and, from a sporting point of view, allowed them to get their bearings and find the right settings. I think it was a turning point, and those who were really fast in the South in this Vendée Globe left with a level of confidence that you didn’t necessarily have before, when you were only doing a round-the-world race every four years.
Jean Le Cam is also proposing two classifications, one for foilers, the other for daggerboard boats. What do you think?
I’m not in phase with this idea. For me, the strength of the Vendée Globe is the simplicity of its concept. Each edition has its own story to tell, and this year there were indeed battles between different categories of boats, but four years ago, the story was completely different because of the weather, which meant that foilers and daggerboard boats sailed together. I don‘t think the Vendée Globe needs that.
“The black spot, the furlers and hooks”
Let’s talk about the technical assessment: even if the race isn’t over, can you give us the general picture?
As far as we’re concerned, the results are good. As far as the primary structure is concerned, we haven’t had any fundamental problems, which is a very important point. This means that the architects, the structural firms and the teams have done a great job, with quite a few hull bottom reinforcements over the last three years, which have paid off. As for the masts, a subject on which we’ve had a lot of problems since the last Vendée, but where we’ve tried to come up with solutions to ensure that we’re up to scratch in this Vendée, things have gone rather well, except for Pip Hare who dismasted, bearing in mind that Arnaud Boissières didn’t have a one-design mast. In terms of sails, we had a lot of torn sails four years ago, particularly in terms of falls, but this time we had far fewer problems. The sailmakers did a real in-depth job, which enabled us to achieve a level of reliability that we hadn’t seen in previous editions. In terms of electronics, we’re also on the right track, even though system reliability is not a simple matter. On the other hand, the black spot is the furlers and hooks. At the end of the month, we’re going to get the Imoca technical committee to debrief us and see if we need to change our rules, because the level of reliability of all these parts is unsatisfactory, and has potentially jeopardized the racing of a number of skippers, so we’re going to have to react.
A final word on the next edition: is the current economic situation a source of concern for the class?
We’re obviously paying close attention, and we can see that the economic signals are not very favorable. What we can be sure of, however, is that this Vendée Globe has worked: both in sporting and technical terms, as we’ve just said, and also in terms of media impact. The figures already announced by the SAEM are exceptional, and some of the media have also shared their audience figures with us, which are just crazy, which means that this race is working well, so we have a lot of assets to enable the skippers to convince partners.
Photo: Vincent Curutchet / Alea
