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COSTA RICA |
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Sailors predict flat out race to Costa Rica
in the Transat Jacques Vabre
By Stuart Alexander
The wind whipping up the Channel and into
the harbour of Le Havre today served notice
to the 20 yachts in the Bassin Paul Vatine
that, come Sunday when they set off on the
5,000-mile Transat Jacques Vabre to Costa
Rica, that the price of a sunny South
American finish will be an opening autumnal
slap in the face.
For the four British double-handed crews
among the 14 Open 60s, futures are at stake,
reputations are on the line. There will be
no room for error. The man who won the race
two years ago, the current titleholder also
in the Vendee Globe solo round the world,
said bluntly: "This is a race where you put
a heavy stone on the accelerator pedal and
leave it there."
He expects to be pushing his boat Foncia up
to 95 per cent of capacity, compared with 60
to 80 when singlehanded in the Vendee Globe.
His win earlier this year took so much out
of him that, at the moment, he says he
cannot face going again. "Today I don't have
the motivation to do it a third time," he
says.
Sam Davies, partnered by Frenchman Sidney
Gavignet, rivals turned collaborators Dee
Caffari and Brian Thompson, a transitional
Alex Thomson with Ross Daniel, and a
sponsorless Mike Golding digging into his
own funds to race with Spain's Javier Sanso
form a string British presence on what
remains a largely French patch.
This is Golding's sixth appearance in the
coffee company sponsorship of one of the
three big transatlantic races so beloved by
the French - the other two are the Route du
Rhum to Guadeloupe and the daddy of them
all, the British-founded Transat, so far
always out of Plymouth.
It is also one of the only two world class
doublehanded races, the other being the
Barcelona non-stop round the world. Where
long-distance races require a more measured
rhythm, all four of the British crews have
emphasised the need to be quick out of the
blocks in order to be up front when turning
onto the mid-Atlantic belt of favourable
trade winds.
Weather expert and racing router Mike
Broughton says that the new route has
changed the whole conduct of the race. Two
years ago Golding had been in the lead for
five days and then took a losing option
crossing the Doldrums.
There are no Doldrums to cross on the new
route; find yourself near the back after
exiting the Channel, rounding Ushant and
heading south and playing catch-up could be
a forlorn game. "By the time you reach
Madeira you need to be in the lead," say
Broughton. "After that it will be all about
downwind speed."
Expect, also, some of the crews to take
early their only opportunity to play a
24-hour stealth card, which hides their
route choice and progress from being
transmitted to the rest of the fleet and the
world.
If life is uncertain for three of the four
British teams, Alex Thomson has a new deal
in place which will see him doing the
Barcelona race in the latest 60 to carry the
Hugo Boss name, the former Pindar, designed
by Juan Kouyoumdjian.
But, in a cycle which pivots around the
Vendee Globe every four years and which
finished in February this year, life is
uncertain for many. Sam Davies must wait
until early next year to see how Artemis
plans to shape all of its yachting
sponsorship, Dee Caffari's time with Aviva
repeatedly comes to an end and is repeatedly
extended, and Mike Golding is hoping for a
new major sponsor for the Open 60 also to
enter the Barcelona Race.
Thompson and Caffari both take the view that
boatspeed will always be as important as
brains and that making the fewest mistakes
can avoid the "slippery slope" of trying to
play catch up. Caffari is clearly more
confident in her ability to control the boat
after her 30,000 miles round the planet and
"that looking after each other is really
important. This race is huge and a good
result would be awesome, I would really love
it."
Thomson has put behind him a string of
setbacks, including having his boat smashed
just before the start of the last VG and
then, after a massive repair effort to be on
the start line, seeing other related
problems forcing him out of the race.
"I have stopped saying 'why has this
happened to me' and set myself up for the
next one." On the same side of the dock,
Mike Golding's former Ecover now has a new
colour scheme, which he designed himself,
has no sponsor name and he, too, had to
overcome the bitter disappointment of being
dismasted just after taking the lead in the
VG.
"It's nice to be back in the swing of
things," he said. "I have had to dig my hand
into my own pocket in partnership with my
long-time backer Philip Sorensen, but I hope
it will be an investment. I need to prove
the boat after the dismasting, the keel
problems and all the other improvements we
have done, so I need to stay in the arena. I
just hope it isn't a swan song."
Golding at least has a second year of
Extreme 40 sailing in 2010, when he will be
50. The same age as French legend Yves
Parlier, though the wrinkle gods have been
kinder to Golding. Parlier is at the helm of
a Spanish yacht 1876, the year that its
brewery backer Estrella Damm was founded.
He is something of an oracle, but his
judgment is simple, not Delphic. "I think
tactics will be the most important," he
says.
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