Vendée Globe

Loïck Peyron, who had already fully endorsed his ranking as one of the popular favourites to win this Vendée Globe, reported to the Course Direction early this afternoon that he had dismasted at between 1300hrs and 1315hrs UTC.

The solo skipper, who had lead the pack down the Atlantic for 16 days, was down below in his Farr designed Gitana Eighty studying meteo information when he heard a very loud bang. When he got in deck his immediate fears were realized when he found his mast in three or four pieces.

He spent more than an hour and a half cutting free the rig and sails. Peyron is only left with the boom and had set about building a jury rig with it. He told a special radio broadcast at 17h (Paris time) that he would see how Gitana Eighty performed under jury rig, before making a decision where he would head too. At the time of the incident the fleet leaders were about 180 miles south of the tiny Crozet Island and 650 miles from the Kerguelen Islands. Cape Town is about 1850 miles to his NNW and Cape Leeuwin, Australia about 3000 miles to the east. The French skipper reported that there was no damage to the hull and that he was uninjured and in good physical shape. Winds were around 30 knots, he was sailing under single reefed main and Solent headsail.

Peyron told the special Paris Radio Broadcast: “The conditions were perfect at least, I was inside watching the weather forecast on the computer when suddenly there was a  big bang, I sensed that something very, very bad was happening, and when I got out I saw that everything was in the water. No more mast up like it should be, the mast was broken in a few parts, three or four parts maybe. I don’t know the reason, and then after that it is not finished yet because you have the rig and the sails over the boat and so you have to lift and cut everything, and that is a big, big job, with a lot of carbon pieces on the deck, a lot of noise. The pieces of the mast want to make holes in the hull. So it is an hour and a half of big job, so right now I am going to try to do a spare rig (jury rig) with the boom, which is the only part I have which is on the deck now.”

“ The only piece of mast which is on the deck now is no more than one metre and a half. All the rest is sinking right now, I don’t know how deep it is!

“I don’t know where I will go. At first I want to do a rescue (jury) rig with he boom, using a small sail and part of the sail I still have on the boat, on the Gitana Eighty, and then when the spare rig is done and I can see what kind of speed I can do, and what sort of angle I can do regarding the direction of the wind, I could decide.”

“There are three solutions. The first is the longest, is Australia first, and the two others are maybeCape Town or an island between Madagascar or maybe ReunionIsland.

I feel not so bad but not so good. I don’t want to think right now. I just feel bad just now for all the team, I feel sad for Benjamin Rothschild and all the GroupRothschild because without them I cannot be here, so I feel sad for them. But, no, it is not a good day.”

On the race course Sébastien Josse (BT) lead through the middle part of today, but on the 1500h GMT poll, is matched almost evenly with Jean Pierre Dick (Paprec-Virbac 2) who is judged to be just 0.3 miles behind.

With their southerly routing both Roland Jourdain (Veolia Environnement) and Mike Golding, GBR, (Ecover 3) have made gains on the leaders. Jourdain is now third, just 21.4 miles behind Dick, and Golding 28.3 miles off the leading boat.

4th, Mike Golding, GBR, (ECOVER 3) : “ I’ ve just heard of Gitana's dismasting thus afternoon - this is very bad news for the race as Loïck is such a great ambassador for sailing and French sailing in particular.  I feel really very sorry for him as,(apart from myself of course), I had him as a serious favorite to win the race. Whist I don't know Loïck so well personally, he is and always has been, friendly and free with his smiles - he has no edge of arrogance despite his enviable sailing track record. As you can probably tell - I'm a fan and for me to be on the same race course and in combat with such a legend of open class sailing has been amazing.”

“ Conditions are pretty wild, 20kts plus of boatspeed, diving down steep awkward waves with winds ranging between 22 and 35kts frm the west  it's saying something if I tell you that I had to bring the boat off the breeze a little earlier simply to enable me to use my bucket in relative safety. Also add to this that last night was so very cold (SST 3C) that even in full layer thermals and inside my sleeping bag I just could not sleep. So I got up made a drink, hunkering down over the stove. then I charged the batteries which was a great excuse to have the engine on to warm up the nav station. Then with an almost endless stream of hot drinks of all description I sat and trimmed sails and the pilot for many hours - probably in part accounting for my big gains this morning. Over 1/3rd into the Vendee Globe and Ecover is currently 4th and 28 miles behind the leader - thats a little more than the length of the Solent  - Crazy.”

Jonny Malbon, GBR, Artemis: “ I am tearing my hair out to make the boat go. The night was long and exhausting. And now I feel tired and frustrated. The pilot does not manage to control the boat and I cannot ease out the mainsail enough and I cannot control it. And when I think about it this will go on for another two months. When I see the people who are in front of me are going quicker and that is very hard to take. I am a naturally competitive person and I am here to race.”

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