Lying third he is, once
again, more than 750 miles behind the fast moving Brit, Alex Thomson on
Hugo Boss and some 1100 miles behind the race leader Le Cléac’h. Beyou
grew up on the Bay of Morlaix with Le Cléac’h and when they were young,
Beyou took the young Armel out on his father’s Quarter Tonner. Armed
with the Le Cléac’h’s former Banque Populaire, which finished second in
the last race, Beyou has found himself at times frustrated by satellite
comms problems – he cannot access high resolution weather information –
he has struggled with his mast track and his mainsail hook.
But he has
battled on resolutely, latterly sailing fast on the approach to his
first solo Cape Horn. His watchword has always been to sail within his
limits to reach the Horn. Beyou also retired from the first
Barcelona World Race in 2007-8 after being dismasted with Sidney
Gavignet in the Indian Ocean. After each disappointment, Beyou has come
back stronger and fought harder for his Vendée Globe.
In 2008-9 he had
to retire into Recife after only 16 days of racing when two spreader
roots failed and his rigging was damaged. His second Vendée Globe, the
first in the colours of Maître CoQ ended with keel ram damage after just
over one week of racing. “They say real champions are those who can
fight back,” said Beyou at the time. He bounced back and claimed a third
Solitaire du Figaro title in the interim and prepared his Vendée Globe
programme immaculately, not least winning the Transat New York Vendée
and taking second in the 2014 Route du Rhum.
“I have set out around the
world in the Vendée Globe, the Barcelona World Race and the Jules Verne
Trophy, but have never made it around the Horn. So it’s about time!”
Beyou said today.
“The
seas are very rough, so it will be a relief to get around. Especially
after all the previous failed attempts. It’s time also to see something
different as down here it isn’t that nice. After that maybe we will be
back into real racing mode and I’ll be able to see where I am in
comparison to the two ahead of me. It’s a new race that starts. I’m
going to have to work hard in these final weeks…” He added: “The Pacific
was a bit long with conditions that were not that easy. So I’m pleased
to be arriving at Cape Horn and getting out of this zone. I crossed
through a front during the night with quite a lot of wind. I should be
downwind until Cape Horn and afterwards too I hope as the wind is set to
strengthen at the longitude of the cape. So I’ll have gybes to do and
it’s going to be fairly technical. We’re going to have to be careful to
avoid doing anything silly with these winds.”
A complex South Atlantic
Alex Thomson has managed to pull back
small miles on leader Le Cléac’h today, Monday, reducing his deficit to
the skipper who has led the race since December 3rd to under
400 miles. Le Cléac’h faces another slowdown tonight with a high
pressure ridge. The climb up the South Atlantic remains complex.
Behind Beyou, Jean Pierre Dick (St
Michel-Virbac) has moved another 100 miles clear of the chasing duo Yann
Eliès and Jean Le Cam who have continued to struggle with the centre of
a low pressure system. Dick is making 22kts this afternoon on his
foiling St Michel-Virbac while Eliès is making seven knots. Conrad
Colman (Foresight Natural Energy) is racing north and east to avoid the
worst of a big, stormy low which is spinning down from the north and
west of him, but his timing and strategy should see him safe from the
worst of a bad system which is predicted to hold more than 70kts.
And
behind the system, the group of six which had slowed to miss the storm,
are now making faster progress again. Eric Bellion (Commeunseulhomme)
said this morning: “I have had a gust of 37-38 knots and I’m making
twenty knots. The idea was to follow the low and not to go too fast and
hit the worst of it. I have three reefs in the main. We went from total
calm to a storm. I had my coffee with Alan a couple hours ago.
It
suddenly changed. Everything went flying in the boat. The wind is
whistling around. I slept for eight hours during the night. It was a bit
like a pit stop before as I checked everything on the boat. It’s always
a bit frustrating when you have thousands of miles left to sail to see
your speed down to five knots.”
Quotes
Jean Le Cam (Finistère Mer Vent):
“I got slowed in light airs, so had time to do a video and check out
everything on the boat. In my dreams I’d like to complete the race in
less than 80 days. It will chiefly depend on what the conditions are
like when we sail back up. Conditions there can be very random. As far
as the Cape of Good Hope, we can’t complain about what we’re getting.
It’s straight ahead, while in front they are likely to get held up a
bit. And we may make it through just as things are getting easier.
Before we get there it looks like it’s going to be light airs off the
cape. But we’ll see, as the forecasts change very quickly in this zone.
I’ll be getting to the Horn on 31st at 21h06 (laughs).”
Didac Costa (One Planet, One Ocean):
“The last front has allowed me to sail fast and on course for almost 48
hours, but the Christmas truce is over. The wind has begun to drop and a
storm is forming to the south of Australia in the next few hours and
will deepen quickly making difficult the path towards the East in the
coming days. This area between Australia and New Zealand, in addition to
being meteorologically complex due to rapidly developing phenomena, has
an added difficulty: the shore to the north and the ice exclusion zone
to the south limit the possibilities of "negotiating" or dodging the
lows. To avoid sailing upwind -the course that these boats least like- I
am trying to go as far south as possible and maybe I will end up
waiting for the new favourable wind. I repaired the damage in the J3
some days ago, but after a full check I detected principles of
delamination in several areas of the sail. I decided to repair it
properly before hoisting it again. So far with the boat’s movement it
has been impossible to do this job and I will try to do it when the sea
state calms down. I passed the second of the great capes yesterday: Cape
Leeuwin. I hope to be halfway soon. From then on, I will stop moving
away from Les Sables to approach it...”
Eric Bellion (Commeunseulhomme):
“Twelve years ago I crossed the Pacific with a couple of friends on a
small 8m boat. It took us 47 days. So crossing the longitude of Auckland
it will feel like I’m back somewhere I know. I know the route and that
is reassuring.”
Nandor Fa (HUN) Spirit of Hungary:
“I ran out of breeze yesterday morning completely. There was nothing. I
had to sail 80 miles to the north to find new breeze which is what I
now have SW’ly in 20kts, making 12-16kts now which is good but in effect
that is half a day which I lost. I wanted to make some maintenance on
the boat but sometimes I made only three knots of boat speed. The sea
was smooth and the sails flapping. For the next couple of days I can
move with this NW’ly wind I will get, and can make eight or nine hundred
miles with it. I will need to sail close to the ice border because when
a huge anticyclone forms above me then just 50 miles to the north there
will be nothing. Before the start I said I did not care about what
place I finish in. I still don’t care. To be eighth just now is really
nice but it so far from the finish. I am more interested in keeping the
boat alive, moving as fast as possible and as safe as possible.”
(www.vendeeglobe.org)
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