When reading maps and weather files it was expected that the ultimate four trimarans are unlikely to slide at more than 30 knots... As says François Gabart (Macif) this morning ' it will be close-hauled until New York! If this Wednesday 28 June, Queen Mary 2 continues on 24 knots on average, swallowing 564 miles (1044 km) per 24 hours, for the first time since the departure of Saint-Nazaire, Macif "flashed" in late night at 28 knots, is faster than the ocean liner in speed, and sailed for 513 miles during the last 24 hours which says a lot about the potential of terms VPLP.
While Queen Mary 2 is not yet halfway between Saint-Nazaire and New York, the fleet is changing so far (at 3: 00 UTC) in a moderate to fairly strong flow in the sector Northwest and on a relatively handable sea. Macif, still leading, and followed by IDEC SPORT (Francis Joyon) 10 miles, cross-referenced the wake of the ocean liner, and is located on the orthodromic (the shortest route between two points). Sodebo Ultim' (Thomas Coville) is 71 miles from the leader and 231 miles away from Actual (Yves Le Blevec). For now, the logic is respected compared to the age of the boats. In a highly variable wind force, the four multihulls are sailing Southwest on a starboard tack, all are around 20 knots.
The night was physical and dense for the four crews, the shifts are a bit mixed up, and Francis Joyon apologized to cut short the 5 pm shift (Paris time), as the crew was in full operation. Vincent Riou, who played here his first transat in ultimate multihull, confirmed later in the night that "the entire wardrobe of Sodebo Ultim' was well used", as the crew spent part of the night lowering all the front sails.
Words from the sailors (3 h UTC)
Yves le Blévec (Actual) : « It’s going really well! To be honest, I just woke up. We have the weather we expected to get. We tacked West of the Ireland, and since last night we're in a well packed Northwest stream with 25 to 28 knots of wind and moving at a pace near close-hauled on a sea that is not formed too, allowing us to go fast enough. Specifically, we navigate at 60 degrees of the wind because it has engaged a little bit, but tonight it was closer to 50 degrees. As the boats go fast even at this rate, there is a not so comfortable side, and when you start being close-hauled, you tell yourself that it's going to be endless... But we're making progress on the road. The crew is fine. I'm "off-watch" on standby and oilies, ready to give a hand whenever there is a maneuver to do.»
Vincent Riou (Sodebo Ultim’) : «We just passed through a slack zone (no wind; ED) but we now got some wind. It is going well. Conditions are not very, very simple because the wind is changes quite a bit, and in the North Atlantic on these boats, we do not stop changing maneuvers. Here, there are 22-23 knots of wind, we are close-hauled starboard tack. By the end of the race, we'll have some weather patterns with opportunities to come back. In the meantime, we try to be as regular as possible to try to keep up, which should be the case during the day because we will cross a ridge.»
François Gabart (Macif) : « We're not very that far away from our IDEC SPORT friends, and we currently have a small transition area to overcome and slack that will come this morning. So, we will continue to work with these small transitions that will follow one another. Roughly speaking, we'll be close-hauled until New York. The only moment of 'Gennak' that we could do, was between Scilly and Ireland, and it was the only carrying time. Looks like a transat only close-hauled , even if this isn't what we wanted. The crew rotates really well and we picked up the pace as well as our mark on the boat. We exchange and talk well and I am delighted! »