Yann Guichard explains his withdrawal from the Jules Verne Trophy

On February 1, 2019, in the middle of the Jules Verne Trophy attempt, Spindrift 2 broke his starboard float rudder, whose wick had broken between the two levels. His skipper Yann Guichard announced at the time the cessation of its attempt to circumnavigate the globe without a crew stopover . After five days of sailing, the black and gold trimaran has reached the port of Fremantle (near Perth, Western Australia) and should soon be repatriated to France by cargo ship. A solution that is more practical since it would take 3 weeks for the delivery of new rudders, as Yann Guichard explains.

SI HUGO A R?VÉ SON ÉCUME DE MER POUR PARTIR EN GRANDE CROISIÈRE, CELA NE L'EMPÊCHE PAS DE NAVIGUER SUR D'AUTRES VOILIERS. IL NOUS FAIT VIVRE AUJOURD'HUI DANS CET ÉPISODE, LA PARTICIPATION AUX VOILES DE SAINT-BARTH. POUR CELA IL INTÈGRE UN ÉQUIPAGE QUI PARTICIPE SUR UN J/122 (UN VOILIER DE COURSE-CROISIÈRE DE 12 M). We're already going to dismantle the rudder and we're getting organized to have the trimaran brought back by cargo ship. We obviously have a doubt about the other saffron and it's taking a risk to come back by sea to our base, since we're almost at the other end of the world. All the crew and the five men of the technical team who joined us will focus on preparing this cargo return: we have to dismast and put the boat clean for this trip."

An unexplained breakage

"We broke the rudder of the starboard float after the Kerguelen: we don't know exactly when, but Thierry Chabagny, who was at the helm, indicated that it was getting very hard. But we have nothing touché?! We were on port tack heading east-northeast, still downwind under gennaker. As it was at night, we tried to find out why: the parallelism, the tension of the lines, an object in the rudders... But none of this. And when we changed helmsmen, always the same effect: difficult to luff or knock down. It was even becoming more and more "unstoppable", because the boat did what it wanted. It was discovered at dawn that the starboard rudder wick was broken between the two bearings inside the float. The rudder no longer held much and went sideways: it made its life according to the waves and accelerations..." explains Yann Guichard.

crew is with me: we were rather well placed and in record time with rather favourable conditions to follow... And then after the dismasting even before the start a year ago, it's the second time that the equipment has been used on us lâche?! There, we were lucky not to have lost the rudder because it could have ripped off the bottom of the float... We will be able to see if it is a manufacturing defect or a structural miscalculation. Of course we made this trip to the Kerguelen mainly on the port side, but nevertheless: we never pulled more than necessary on the boat with a lot of very downwind conditions, between 140° and 155°. Spindrift 2 is going much faster than three years ago in our first attempt: we had the cards in hand despite less favourable weather conditions than IDEC Sport in the ocean Indien?! It's really frustrating to know that we haven't touched anything, that we haven't done anything unusual to make this happen...">

A big disappointment and a pending analysis

"For the moment, we are focusing on the explanations to be found for this rudder breakage: beyond the cost, it is also a manufacturing delay and the work sites are rather busy in the coming months... If it is necessary to redo a different part, it will take a long time. It is still a little early to know what we will decide: we will have to wait for the meeting we will organize with all the stakeholders and the analyses of this case. We'll first settle down and think before taking a decision on the next part of the program, Jules Verne Trophy or not next winter..."