The China Mail - High-speed, high-risk Route du Rhum yacht race sets off Sunday

Every skipper will make the Atlantic crossing alone, safe in the knowledge that they should be spared the challenge of an autumn storm in the Bay of Biscay.

Charles Caudrelier is one of the favourites in a race that takes place every four years. Having set the record for the race in 2022, at six days and 19 hours, aboard the revolutionary Gitana 17 maxi-trimaran, the Frenchman is taking a giant leap into the unknown aboard a new boat.

On paper, the Y-shaped appendages of the multi-million-euro Gitana 18-Maxi Edmond de Rothschild and its still-hidden technical devices should allow him to win -- the boat is capable of exceeding 50 knots (nearly 60 mph, or 96 km/h) -- but it was launched in February and has never been used in competition since.

"The others have boats they've been sailing for four or five years. I can see the difference between their level of knowledge of the boat and mine. There are still many situations I've never encountered on board," Caudrelier said.

"I see this Route du Rhum first and foremost as the beginning of a story between this boat and me. Of course, we're here to try and win, but also to learn and prepare for the future," he said.

The ideal weather forecast for the first few days of the crossing could work in his favour, allowing him to avoid putting too much strain on his boat.

Armel Le Cleac'h is a well-known name in France, where yachtsmen and women can attain a celebrity status not afforded in other countries.

At the age of 49, he is hoping to finally win his category of a race that has eluded him in a distinguished career that has included winning the round-the-world Vendee Globe.

"You always have to bounce back from your failures. I've done three Vendee Globes and I've finished on the podium each time and won it once," Le Cleac'h said.

"I tell myself that it's going to happen for me on the Route du Rhum one day or another."

Le Cleac'h recalls that he was nine in 1986 when the French skipper Loic Caradec was lost at sea days after the start of the race.

"I had gone to see Loic Caradec's boat in Saint Malo with my parents. It was impressive, it was the only thing we could see. And one evening, when I got home from school, I learned that his catamaran had disappeared," Le Cleac'h said.

The weather blew up in 2022, forcing the start to be delayed, but the weather forecast this year is good.

At 24, Basile Bourgnon is embarking on his first Route du Rhum, and is a contender for the title in the Ocean Fifty class.

As the son of Laurent Bourgnon, the only sailor to have won the race twice, but who died in a diving accident in 2015, the race is part of his DNA.

"This is the transatlantic race of my dreams. Of course, there's a family aspect to it -- I learned after his death that my father adored this race," he said.

C.Fong--ThChM