Rounding Cape Horn

almost 10 days ahead of the record now!

thats some serious COJONES! damn

Faster than Orange II to the equator and between Good Hope and Australia. Was fast in the Pacific too. The guy may finish under 60 days. Impressive...

Joyon had near perfect condition all the way to Australia. Unfortunately another competitor is not been so fortunate,
Thomas Coville is already 2 days behind Joyon's schedule and losing.

Coville's Location
Trimaran Sodeb'O

that's a very cute animated gif jake

Disagree.
Francis Joyon made this happen: picked up the right date to start, negotiated very well the doldrums and st Ellen highs, pushed hard in front of a system in the indian ocean to stay in the right wind/sea etc... The guy is good at dealing with weather, which is a very important part of the record.

Also at a critical moment as he was rounding Africa, he stayed awake 24 hours so he could push the boat speed to the limit to catch a low pressure system. He has had good weather but I agree with Tiger (did I just say that!?)...the physical and mental strength required for this has got to be unbelievable...especially when the boat rarely goes below 18 knots.

Wow, I guess there really is "no second place..."

Joyon is 10 days ahead of the record, and Coville is 2 days behind. Using my math, that puts Coville 8 days ahead of the record too. Isn't 8 days enough to be considered also destroying the old record???

These guys have to be absoulutely certifiable...

Mike

I don't know how somebody can sleep AT ALL, when alone on a boat that is hurtling across the ocean at incredible speeds. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />

Coville is not very far along into his route and has been slipping on Ellen McArther's 2005 pace. At the point Coville is at now, Joyon was 2 days ahead of the virtual Ellen.

You're both wrong actually, Joyon was 5d15h ahead on Ellen time and Coville is now only 1d12h ahead of Ellen and 4(!) days behind Joyon.

See how perfect Joyon's course was from the equator towards Cape Town?
Some might not agree with me but IMHO some luck is involved considering that Coville is as good (if not better) a sailor than Joyon.

Well, my point wasn't about the accuracy of the times (since I only know what I'm reading here), just that the poor bastard running second isn't getting accolades for running ahead of Ellen (assuming that he still is)...

Just to show my complete ignorance, are these guys running through the icebergs while trying to sleep?

Mike

They're trying to stay north of the ice / growler field but Joyon had some pretty wild pictures of some big bergs and reports that it's further north than he has ever seen it. Radar picks up the ones that are floating well above the surface....

But isn't Joyon running without radar? I have not checked but read he had very limited electronics aboard. Does that include radar?

Picked up "Race Against Time" over xmas...it's Ellen's day to day account of her record breaking '05 run. Highly recommend this to anyone that wants to get any sense of what it's like doing an around-alone record attempt.

She too reported 'bergs well North of where they had been sighted by other ships...and she also comments that none were showing up on her radar.

Mike.

What are the specs for IDEC vs what Ellen sailed (B&Q/Castorama).

I believe both boats are purpose built, Neil Irens designs...but how are they different?

What I cannot grasp is how the heck can one person do all the sail changes...WITHOUT stopping! Ellen reports doing 12-20 sail changes in a 24 hr period!!!

I sail on Afterburner, a 52 ft "beachcat"...we race with 6 aboard and it is a major effort all round when changing a head sail. We cannot raise/lower the main or engage reefing points without going head to wind...and even then it takes five burly guys to hoist the main up, one guy using the biggest winch on the boat and the rest of us "rowing" the extremely taught halyard. This inches the sail up the 80 ft mast.

Amazing stuff.

Coville's Sodeb'O:
* Designers: Nigel Irens / Benoît Cabaret
* Length: 32 metres (105 feet)
* Width: 16,55 metres (55 feet)
* Weight : 12 tonnes
* Draught: 2,50 mètres
* Surface main: 227 m²
* Surface solent : 152 m²
* Surface gennaker : 305 m²
* Surface Jib ORC : 48 m²
* Mast height: 35 m

Joyon's IDEC:
* Designers: Nigel Irens / Benoît Cabaret
* Length: 29.70 metres
* Width: 16,50 metres
* Weight : 11 tonnes
* Draught: <Unknown>
* Upwind Area: 350 m²
* Downwind Area: 520 m²
* Mast height: 32 m

Ellen's B&Q/Castorama:
* Displacement: 8.3 tonnes
* Length: 22.9m
* Beam: 16.2m
* Mast height: 30.6m
* Standing rigging: 253.2m
* Maximum break tonnes (Genoa): 43 tonnes
* Main hull surface area: 143.9 m2
* Main hull internals surface area: 37.29 m2
* Crossbeams surface area: 51.34 sq m
* Floats surface area: 151.48 m2
* Floats internal surface area: 35.78 m2
* Total surface area: 419.79 m2
* Designers: Nigel Irens/Benoit Cabaret (Nigel Irens Design)
* Builders: Boatspeed, Australia
* Project management: Offshore Challenges project

Coville has no experience for this type of records and a lot less multihull under the belt.

Very sad news...

From: www.sodebo-voile.com


"RETIREMENT OF THOMAS COVILLE FROM HIS SINGLE-HANDED ROUND THE WORLD RECORD ATTEMPT IN A MULTIHULL

Precisely 5 minutes after beating the 24 hour distance record and whilst sailing at the latitude of the Kerguelen Islands, Thomas went up on deck to reduce the sail area and discovered that he had lost the crash box from his starboard float. Even though it's too early to say whether it's the result of impact or not Thomas, who saw two icebergs measuring several hundred metres long yesterday, observed that there were some growlers - pieces of partially submerged ice, around the boat. Acting as a kind of bumper, the crash box is there to avoid breaking the whole boat in the event of impact with something and also ensures the float’s watertightness.
The trimaran is currently rerouting to Cape Town (South Africa) some 1,300 miles away.

We can imagine the skipper’s disappointment after just beating - at 0H45 UTC – the single handed 24 hour record. Thomas covered the 619.3 miles at an average of 25.8 knots. In so doing he beats the record held by Francis Joyon (616.03) by three miles. The record is currently awaiting approval from the WSSRC.
It should be noted that Thomas broke the record during his 20th day at sea, just like Francis Joyon, whilst in the same zone of the Indian Ocean, with a fairly similar weather pattern, ahead of a depression.

Follow the latest news about the Trimaran Sodeb'O on the website www.sodebo-voile.com"