"And the closest person to that point is actually up in space."

December 9, 2020 3:42 PM

"You're three or four months on the boat... you're three or four months alone... and you're in the most rough and inhospitable areas in the world. You sail past the point... that is the furthest away from land." Pieter Heerema talks about competing in a previous edition of the Vendée Globe, a quadrennial round-the-world solo sailing race.

The 2020 edition of the Vendée Globe is currently underway. There has already been plenty of rough weather (translation in closed captions), and a dramatic rescue after a boat snapped in half.

At the same time, and taking advantage of the same round-the-world sailing season, two one boat is making an attempt on the Jules Verne Trophy (news en Français) for the fastest circumnavigation by any sailing vessel with any sized crew. As trimarans, they go about twice as fast as the monohulls of the Vendée Globe (previously), and hope to break the 40-day barrier. You can follow their progress against the old record to see if they make it back to France by January 5th.

posted by clawsoon (11 comments total)

A previously that I missed for the 2008 Vendée Globe.
posted by clawsoon at 3:43 PM on December 9, 2020

One of the competitors is Boris Hermann, sailing the boat he also used to bring Greta Thunberg to New York.
posted by ocschwar at 5:48 PM on December 9, 2020 [4 favorites]

Very cool. Been casually following and this takes incredible know how. Can you share which article highlights the closest person to them is in space? Amazing to think about
posted by glaucon at 6:57 PM on December 9, 2020

Can you share which article highlights the closest person to them is in space?

It is called Point Nemo and it gets mentioned in the talk with Heerema.
posted by bdc34 at 7:28 PM on December 9, 2020 [2 favorites]

I'm thinking now that a better pull quote from the interview might've been the part where he capsized 22 times during the race, mostly because the low-quality software in his autopilot kept turning him around in random directions.
posted by clawsoon at 7:55 PM on December 9, 2020 [2 favorites]

I know that recorded audio, especially at the non professional level, can be misleading but holy crap you can hear the Jules Verne Trophy boat just shredding the water.
posted by Mitheral at 8:13 AM on December 10, 2020 [1 favorite]

Taking a sail foil craft through the southern oceans is astounding. The video of these craft moving so fast through heavy weather boggles my mind. I did not realize they could stay on foils in those conditions.
posted by pdoege at 9:07 AM on December 10, 2020 [2 favorites]

Thanks for this post. I've been watching the weekly recaps of the Vendée Globe. Very entertaining.
posted by ericost at 9:07 AM on December 10, 2020 [1 favorite]

Also, this is a neat onboard tour of the Ultime Sodebo, the boat going for the Jules Verne Trophy.
posted by ericost at 9:11 AM on December 10, 2020 [1 favorite]

I could swear I saw a clip of Alex Thomson recreating his Hugo Boss mast walk, but this time by himself on the open ocean to fix some gear at the top of his mast, but I'm not finding it now.
posted by clawsoon at 3:41 PM on December 10, 2020

Sodebo drops out of Jules Verne attempt, which means that the 40 day fully-crewed record will remain untouched this year.
posted by clawsoon at 4:49 PM on December 12, 2020