Yeah, that is sad news.

Crossing back the equator 12 days and 11 hours ahead of the record.

Under 60 days, I tell you.

From SA today:

"With more than 22 800 miles on the clock, covered at high speed, IDEC is showing signs of getting tired. At the end of a dantesque night, fighting squalls in the Doldrums, Francis Joyon has reported two problems, are slowing his progress towards the finish.

A breakage of the mainsail halyard forced Francis to undertake a first perilous ascent of the mast, last night, and at the head he discovered a much more serious problem, where the starboard stay is anchored. This heavy cable, which keeps the mast in position laterally, is fixed by a spindle that had started to unscrew. This meant that Francis had to descend for tools, then climb the mast again to try to stabilize the stay and screw home this vital part.

Francis has an ankle injury

These ascents of the mast, in extremely dangerous conditions, subjected Francis to numerous bodily shocks and he sustained an ankle injury during the second climb. He has now decided to have a rest and wait for a more regular northerly wind to calm the sea a little: "I hurt my ankle during my second climb, because the boat was moving so much." he said. " I will take a little time to recover and to think about the best way to resolve the problem." Under three reefs and staysail, IDEC is only moving slowly away from the Doldrums.

'I'm trying to advance as best as I can for the time being." Said an obviously tired Francis Joyon "I am in around 18 knots of wind, but I cannot go quickly bearing in mind the shape of the sails is now aimed at preserving the mast."

A difficult repair

With a very confused sea and without appropriate tools, Francis only succeded in attaching the genaker halyard, to help the stay and - if the stay should detach - to slow the rate of fall of the carbon mast. Sea conditions make it impossible to make further repairs.

Francis has been on the phone to his shore team and the mast designers to discuss possible ways of preventing the spindle unwinding and best managing the risks involved. "

It looks like Joyon is a shoe in for the single handed record, provided nothing breaks. Has anyone figured out how close he is to the outright record set by Orange?

He has uber problems. Shroud or cap shroud is coming unscrewed; he does not have the tools to do it back up properly.

He's (last night) got 3 reefs in and storm jib up, Spi halyard is bing used as a jury rig to support the mast while he works out what to do. He's been up the mast again today to strap it up spectra and he thinks it's strong enough to shake out another reef.

Et voila!

He crushed the record.

Fantastic Joyon.

He is over the line now? Well ahead of schedule then? Fantastic! He has got to be made of steel!

clocks still ticking on the website...

13 miles to go!

my grandmother got to live in the time of both the wright brothers and concord while sailing took a break

but now in my lifetime we've gone from Sir Robin Knox-Johnston taking 313 days to round the globe solo, in 1968/69 to Francis Joyon, doing it in 57 days today

how much more can be taken off that?

incroiable

57 days 13 hours 34 minutes 6 seconds. I'm gobsmacked

Bested the old record by Dame Ellen McArthur by a tad over two weeks !!!!!

That is a 20% improvement, wow !

Wouter

He is only 5 hours short of the record set by the fully crewed Playstation!

According to "madforsailing" he was FASTER than Steve Fosett.
" To give some comparison the year before Orange II's attempt, Steve Fossett and the crew of Cheyenne took 58 days 9 hours and 32 minutes while Olivier de Kersauson and Geronimo, again fully crewed, took 63 days 13 hours and 59 minues"

/hakan

Not to take away from the achievement, but how much of that improvement was due to weather routing technology?

Weather routing aside, someones still got to drive the thing hard for all that time!