Our Mate Alex Thomson’s Races

[Giles]

What Alex gets up to next will be released as a vid any minute…...

[Mild7]

That's insane!

[Giles]

Utterly…....

[Giles]

[Snowy]

For some reason I feel like getting a Hugo Boss suit. Also some amazing work by the skipper to get the boat over that far and hold it there.

[Giles]

[Finn666]

BOSS!…

[Giles]

The Out Takes….

[Friday]

AMAZING!!!!

[derivative666]

That's some James Bond shit right there.

[Giles]

Whoops…..

http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2014/05/08/hugo-boss-breaks-mast/

[Graeme]

Obviously walking up masts isn't good for them.

Alex will almost certainly have a spare rig lying around. Provided the boat isn't damaged, it shouldn't be a major setback.

[Giles]

Yep he will, but they're taking the boat so it can compete in this:

http://www.sailweb.co.uk/offshore/18802/ocean-masters-new-york-to-barcelona-race

(Alex is not doing it as baby #2 is due soon)

The race starts on 1st June, so I guess it depends where the spare rig is and whether they can get it to NYC in time.

This is the boat that Alex bought off JP Dick that lost it's keel in the last vendee….

[Graeme]

Interview with Alex done by Sailing Anarchy.

[Graeme]

I'm a few days slow in posting this, but Alex has officially announced he's getting a new boat.

For the sailing nerds, it's a Guillaume Verdier / VPLP design, which is very much the flavour of the moment in the IMOCA world.

And looking at this photo, he's already hard at work thinking of what stunt he can do this time!

[Giles]

This is so exciting.  Last Vende (in his "old" boat") he could effectively keep up with the newer generation boats, now he will be playing with a full deck (excuse the pun)…...

[Graeme]

It sounds like he's into negotiations to build her at Green Marine too. Given the ramping up of Ben Ainslie's America's Cup team down that way, he could have access to some very good composite guys…

There's a comment about foiling in the press release...

McGoldrick said; “This Vendèe Globe cycle will be particularly exciting as we will almost certainly see the use of foils not too dissimilar to those used in the Americas Cup.  The foils should significantly increase the performance of the boats, an increase we have not seen since the canting keel was invented.  Today all the simulations are theory based and of course theory can be very different to reality, so it is going to be a fascinating next 12 months to see what emerges”.

[Giles]

I saw Alex at the week end, he is both excited and daunted about the new build….

http://www.barcelonaworldrace.org/en/news/news/homage-paid-to-alex-thomson-s-keel-walk

[Graeme]

There's a piece up at the Daily Sail, and another at Sailing Scuttlebutt about the sorts of foils the IMOCA teams are looking at fitting to their boats for the next Vendee.

The technology is derived from Hugh Welbourne's Dynamic Stability System. Basically the foil generates a lifting force that stabilises the boat, rather than relying on righting movement from either a keel (as in a monohull), or the hull form (multihulls).

I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with. It's possible that they'll get the boats flying…

Which would give Alex another appendage to surf on!

[Giles]

I chatted to Alex at a BBQ other day.  He's not sure it will fly, just "unweight" the boat…..