Vendee Globe and Alex Thomson / Hugo Boss

Ok so is Jean Le Cam winning this race? He is due some time or distance adding for the rescue. I am not sure how much they will give him but given how bunched they are at the front it must put him in a strong position.
 
Seven Spades said:
Ok so is Jean Le Cam winning this race? He is due some time or distance adding for the rescue. I am not sure how much they will give him but given how bunched they are at the front it must put him in a strong position.
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Would be nice to know wouldn't it.

Amazing, after 17,000 odd miles, three boats are within 80 miles of each other.
 
LONG_KEELER said:
Would be nice to know wouldn't it.

Amazing, after 17,000 odd miles, three boats are within 80 miles of each other.
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It is amazing, and when you deduct the time owing to the boats that were involved in the rescue of Kevin Escoffier, there are even more boats in that mix at the front.

The pedant in me feels obliged to point out that so far they've actually covered about 10400 miles, Charlie Dalin having about 13800 to run as of this morning.
 
Interesting discussion with Guillaume Verdier re PRB sinking:

Let's talk about what happened to PRB, a boat you designed in collaboration with VPLP, how do you analyze this unprecedented case?
Obviously I was surprised. But in retrospect we have to put it in context. The boat was designed in 2009 as a sistership to Safran (now MACSF), which we no longer monitored and which also has a long history of damages. The architects [Juan's Kouyoumdjian, Editor's note] added foils and I have no idea what reinforcements were made at that time. It’s not for lack of asking as I asked for plans and calculation reports, which I only got the day after the breakage. For me, that is not good that there is not A to Z tracking of a boat. But in the end we cannot impose that if skipper decides to work with someone else.

What other lessons can be learnt?
I think that boats setting off on such a dangerous race around the world should be tested to see whether they are resistant enough and that they will not break up at sea. That is what we do for example in the America’s Cup, but also with mechanical objects such as airplanes, because lives can be at stake. You have to understand that at the moment she folded up, she was already broken, as this sort of thing is usually the consequence of a gradual series of breakages.
 
Lightwave395 said:
Interesting discussion with Guillaume Verdier re PRB sinking:

Let's talk about what happened to PRB, a boat you designed in collaboration with VPLP, how do you analyze this unprecedented case?
Obviously I was surprised. But in retrospect we have to put it in context. The boat was designed in 2009 as a sistership to Safran (now MACSF), which we no longer monitored and which also has a long history of damages. The architects [Juan's Kouyoumdjian, Editor's note] added foils and I have no idea what reinforcements were made at that time. It’s not for lack of asking as I asked for plans and calculation reports, which I only got the day after the breakage. For me, that is not good that there is not A to Z tracking of a boat. But in the end we cannot impose that if skipper decides to work with someone else.

What other lessons can be learnt?
I think that boats setting off on such a dangerous race around the world should be tested to see whether they are resistant enough and that they will not break up at sea. That is what we do for example in the America’s Cup, but also with mechanical objects such as airplanes, because lives can be at stake. You have to understand that at the moment she folded up, she was already broken, as this sort of thing is usually the consequence of a gradual series of breakages.
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Surely you would need to destroy a boat to properly test it? That would make the race twice as expensive in boat terms.
 
I don't think I would want to be a RTW racing boat designer as a day job.

The brief is always make it strong but very light. I suppose you can place an aircraft wing in a wind tunnel for three months and come up with probabilities, but stresses on RTW yachts seem almost impossible to simulate . I suppose the best you can do is an autopsy on what's left, if you've got some , and keep it in mind for the future.

Fascinated to know what happened with Hugo Boss .
 
It's early days with these foiling boats, the designers are on a pretty steep learning curve about the stresses and strains imposed in the real world of the Southern Ocean.

Guillaume Verdier most certainly should not be asked to shoulder the blame for the catastrophic failure of PRB if such major modification as the addition of foils was undertaken without any reference to him.
 
LONG_KEELER said:
I don't think I would want to be a RTW racing boat designer as a day job.
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Some will see that as a challenge.
LONG_KEELER said:
The brief is always make it strong but very light. I suppose you can place an aircraft wing in a wind tunnel for three months and come up with probabilities, but stresses on RTW yachts seem almost impossible to simulate . I suppose the best you can do is an autopsy on what's left, if you've got some , and keep it in mind for the future.
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There are ways of non destructive testing, but going out and riding a storm (a bit like Erik Aanderaa did on one of his videos) looks to me like a good idea. I did ask very early on this thread or one in the Racing sub-forum if this had been done.
LONG_KEELER said:
Fascinated to know what happened with Hugo Boss .
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I have asked on LinkedIn if they are planning to publish a report on the incident.
 
If I am reading the weather correctly, look out for a very interesting juncture in the race in 72-96 hours.

There is a very small weather window coming up that means that the relatively relaxed moderate wind sailing that the leaders are enjoying could change into a twitchy anxious sail where they try to squeeze every knot of speed from their boats.

It looks like there will be a very narrow corridor of good wind just above the IEZ once the race leaders drop down to the lower IEZ past the longitude of Cape Leuin all the way past NZ. Above and behind this narrow band there are a couple of windless days.

A race organiser could not have devised a more devious test.

Any of the leading pack that are too slow to make it onto this narrow windy escalator are likely to see their podium hopes dented.

The leading three boats look like they will probably catch it but for everyone else it will be a worry.

What a great race this is turning out to be!
 
Frogmogman said:
It's early days with these foiling boats, the designers are on a pretty steep learning curve about the stresses and strains imposed in the real world of the Southern Ocean.

Guillaume Verdier most certainly should not be asked to shoulder the blame for the catastrophic failure of PRB if such major modification as the addition of foils was undertaken without any reference to him.
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I am surprised no one is data harvesting...
As said, it is impossible to predict what stresses the components will come under. The only way is to record live data and then analyse it later.
 
So . What does the team think so far.

Out of the top ten, only three are non foilers, but they are lying 4, 5 and 6. On current data, could a non foiler
still win or even have a future in the next Vendee ? It still isn't clear if you are better off hitting something in a foiler or not . Are added foils as good as boats designed to have them ?

I think only one yacht has lost a mast and no keel fall off's which is great. One hopes , barring bad luck, that if you have made it so far you have a good boat.
 
LONG_KEELER said:
One hopes , barring bad luck, that if you have made it so far you have a good boat.
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There's a helluva long, hard road ahead. The Indian Ocean broke several boats, but the deep south of the Pacific Ocean broke more than a few boats, too. 'Point Nemo' is where it all becomes very serious, and no easy get-outs.
 
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