The Ultim 32/23 class brings together the “giant” trimarans taking part in very high-level offshore races, such as Brest Atlantiques, La Route du Rhum, or Nice Ultimed. Find the latest news and investigations from Tip & Shaft on the subject.
At one year before the start of the Arkea Ultim Challenge-Brest which will start on January 7, 2024, the Ultim class has appointed a new general secretary, Stéphane Guilbaud. It is a good chance for Tip & Shaft to take stock of the priority issues awaiting the latter.
After the 2022 season which ended with third place in the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe in the Ultim class, Thomas Coville has been back on the water during this first week of the year. The crew of Sodebo Ultim 3 is now ready to take on the Route of Discovery record between Cadiz and San Salvador (Bahamas). The record of 6 days 14 hours and 29 minutes has been held since 2013 by Spindrift 2. Tip & Shaft spoke with Coville.
After an impressive 2022 season on the Figaro Beneteau circuit which was marked by four victories from four solo races, including winning the pinnacle Solitaire du Figaro and the title of French Elite offshore racing champion, Tom Laperche is preparing to compete on The Ocean Race with the crew of Holcim PRB before he then continues the 2023 season on François Gabart’s Ultim SVR Lazartigue. That is quite the programme for a 25-year-old sailor who talks to Tip & Shaft.
Charles Caudrelier won the 12th edition of the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe in Ultim on Wednesday. Aided by experts – sailors Pascal Bidégorry and Franck Cammas, the race director of Finistère Atlantique (among others things) Gildas Morvan, Christian Le Pape, former director of the Finistère racing center off Port-la-Forêt, and Pierre-Marie Bourguinat, journalist who follows the Ultims for the organization -, Tip & Shaft, offers you a decryption of this announced success.
The 12th edition of the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe started on Wednesday at 2:15 p.m., and there has been no shortage of twists in the first 24 hours, some of them very cruel such as the abandonment of Sam Goodchild from the Ocean Fifty class, the U-turn of Armel Le Cléac’ h in Ultim, a class in which Charles Caudrelier is under the threat of a 4 hour penalty. Tip & Shaft brought together two weather routing specialists, Dominic Vittet and Christian Dumard – who are respectively part of the routing cells of Yves Le Blevec and Francis Joyon in Ultim – to discuss the weather scenario at the start of the race.
As in every major event, Tip & Shaft has mustered a panel of experts to analyse field in each class for the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe which starts this Sunday November 6. For this second part now looking at the Ultims and Class40s, we have coaches Tanguy Leglatin and Etienne Saïz, designer Vincent Lauriot Prévost, co-founder of VPLP, Gildas Morvan, ex Figarist who was race director this year for the Finistère Atlantique and the 24h Ultim, sailors Achille Nebout and Pascal Bidégorry, as well as Didier Ravon, journalist for Voiles & Voiliers and Liberation.
Four Ultims set off on Saturday from Lorient for the 24H Ultim, a solo race of around 500 miles, which is designed to serve as a dress rehearsal at just over a month before the start of the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe. Among these starters will be Banque Populaire XI, whose skipper Armel Le Cléac’h took time out to answer questions from Tip & Shaft.
Thursday this week saw a hearing held in the Paris court to examine the action brought by the Kresk group against the Ultim 32/23 class, the two parties opposing on whether the SVR Lazartigue trimaran conforms to the exact rules of the class (see our article). During the process Samuel Tual, CEO of Actual, and Ronan Lucas, director of Team Banque Populaire, explained themselves during a telephone press briefing. Tip & Shaft looks back on the day.
Last Tuesday François Gabart arrived in Marseille at the helm of his trimaran SVR Lazartigue, which is making a tour of the Mediterranean to meet staff of the Kresk group. It seemed like a good opportunity for Tip & Shaft to talk with him about the performance of the trimaran and of course also the dispute between his team and the Ultim 32/23 class which is now bound for the courts.
Yves Le Blevec is the Deputy Mayor of La Trinité-sur-Mer in charge of water sports and tourism, he is race director of the Mini en Mai which starts on May 17 and of course is also the skipper of Actual Ultim (which was runner up on the last Route du Rhum as Francois Gabart’s Macif 100) which has just been relaunched. And so clearly Yves Le Blevec is something of a busy man. Before his solo training started he took the time to talk to Tip & Shaft.
François Gabart opened up on the dispute between his team and the Ultim 32/23 class – in effect made up of Sodebo, Banque Populaire, Actual, and more recently Gitana Team – regarding the rules compliance of the trimaran SVR Lazartigue. Since then the parties have stuck to their guns. Tip & Shaft runs back over the chain of events which now finds a deadlock situation.
The retirement last summer of long time supremo Christian Le Pape marked something of a turning point in the history of the Pôle Finistère at Port-la-Forêt, the famous race training centre that he founded in the early 1990s. For Jeanne Grégoire, the new director, and Erwan Tabarly, coach, they are really now having to step up the offering in the face of constantly increasing and improving race centres which are in competition with Pôle Finistère.
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