Vendée Globe

Michel Desjoyeaux is without question one of the favourites to win this remarkable Vendée Globe with his Farr designed Foncia.

After branching out into the world of multihull racing, Mich Desj is back for ‘one more time’ to see if he can repeat his 2001 victory against this incredible field of solo racers. Last year he not only came back to win the Figaro Solo, won the SNSM when debuting Foncia but went on to win the Transat Jacques Vabre as well.

His attention to detail, clever, shrewd thinking is legendary both in terms of his fastidious approach to boat preparation – where he knows very small piece of his Open 60 – as well as his tactical sailing on the water. He is in no doubt that the tactical breaks will be limited this time, and this will be the closest Vendée Globe race ever. He speaks in appropriately quiet, measured tones, his answers pared to a bare simplicity, but with a clear passion for this race.

He and the Foncia team will be using every minute to check and improve, right til when it is time to slip her lines and head for the start line: 

“ We have ten days to continue to work. For sure we don’t have the problems that Alex has to manage now, but we carry on working now until the start. There is always something to do. When you see a Formula 1 car, even with 400 people, they carry on until maybe ten seconds before the start. So there is no way for us not to continue to work right until the start, just mini things, small inputs. We change a few ropes, and just finish a few things we started before we arrive here.” Desjoyeaux confirms today, calm and relaxed, “ Everything essential is done, but we just try not to spend time at the bar!”  

He is happy with the choices they have made in terms of where Foncia sits on the design spectrum of new Vendée Globe IMOCA Open 60’s:

“ I think we have a boat which is in the middle of the class, in terms of the sizing of the boat. In fact when we worked with the designer and we went for the biggest that we thought a normal, simple single-handed guy was able to do, there is no more use to make the biggest boat.”

“I don’t know, for sure I am happy not to have the biggest boat in the fleet when I see the height of Pindar’s mast, I think he will have a hard job to change the sails. And also when I saw his mast I thought his mast was actually two metres more than what he has, so I am more confident. But now anyway it is too late to change the weight of the boat or the height of the mast, so we have to compete with what we have and be confident that we are close to the best solution.”

“ In a single-handed race I consider that the boat makes one third of the result, two thirds is from the man, and from the way of sailing, the strategy and the course he will choose over three months. And of course before all of that you can have damage to the boat and to the sails, because of using them badly.”

The Transat Jacques Vabre win confirmed the Foncia is fast, and updates since then have been relatively small refinements:

“ The boat is not the same as the beginning but all the changes are very minimal because the boat we made at the beginning is not too bad. We were able to build a boat which was 300 kilos under the weight data of the boat, while keeping a keel which was heavier than what was previous. So we can consider that the boat was already good. We just changed the keel to move the weight aft a little, but not decreasing the righting moment.”

 “The sails are all the same, we have a second mast arriving on a truck next Friday to be ready to go on the boat if I break this one.”

“ I have not decided what sails I will take exactly. I will make that decision when I look at the weather for the first fifteen days, depending if we start upwind or downwind, I will carry 10 or 11 sails.”

It is always a problem choosing between the weight to carry and the possibility of breaking sails, actually we decided to have no spare sails. But the spinnaker, for example, is only 45 kilos, and obviously we will sail harder than four years ago, and much much harder than eight years ago. So you can understand that we will be able to break spinnakers, for example.”

While many have billed this as a big comeback to the Vendée Globe, he confirms that it was pretty much as he finished in 2001 that he knew he would be back, some time:

“ Seven years ago. The last race I was sailing multihulls. I knew at the finish in 2001 that I would make one more Vendée Globe. But I did not know which one I would make, except that 2004 I was busy.”

And this will be a race which offers very few chances to make a tactical break, thanks to the advances in meteo forecasting and routing technology:

“ I think that now we have weather forecasts which are able to look further ahead and predict more accurately than four years, and eight years ago. So it will be easier to decide routes and the strategies will be closer. For sure you are talking about a closer fleet race.

If you remember that when I won I decreased the time by 12 days, Vincent decreased the time by six days, and so this time it will decrease by three days. Eight years ago I was 25 hours ahead of second, Vincent was six hours ahead of second. This time….maybe one or two hours.” 

Such a tight race is something he positively relishes:

“It is good, that is why I am so happy to be here. This is definitely a sports event in the true sense of the words, not for me another circumnavigation.”

“The British are here in bigger numbers. It is interesting to see their new boats we never saw before which is Pindar. We appreciate that a sponsor can continue to use money for a boat which is staying in the harbour without a mast, but this boat is quite interesting. It is not the answer we were waiting in the sizing when we decided with Bruce Farr and Associates, when we decided to make PRB and Foncia, but it is quite interesting and now we have to wait and see. For sure we will know in 90 days.”

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