Marine IT routage: Joyon's Atlantic record

Francis Joyon is a French professional sail boat racer and yachtsman, holding the record for the fastest single-handed sailing circumnavigation, however and since a few days he is the fastest man on the Atlantic too, catch me if you can! Just above 5 days and 2 hours, Francis Joyon demonstrate (one more time) that Marine ICT and sailing are definitly working together. Talking of technology one cannot quote Francis Joyon and not to mention his long time routeur and comrade Jean Yves Bernot.

Jean Yves Bernot is a french meteorologist forcaster but a sailor too, he was navigator on the 1986 Atlantic record (Loïc Caradec). He did help Michel Desjoyeaux, Ellen MacArthur or Vincent Riou to prepare a better race strategy on Vendée Globe, the french version of Volvo Ocean Race (formerly the Whitbread Round the World Race) only more difficult as it follows the 40th parallele for most of the race, and it is sailed single-handed, non-stop and without assistance. Beat that for a challenge! During the trip from New York to Lizard Point, Bernot will play a key role as Routeur. Ship routing is not much talked about, yet it is one of the most important part of winning a race nowadays.

IDEC is the longest, simplest and lightest trimaran for a LONE man around the world, it isn't exactly a revolutionnary new design, simply an efficient trimaran of its time. The success of the operation is not to be seen in the slim design or the sails but rather in the communications ship to shore and shore to ship.

On the sketch below we can see that there are not bulbous bows, bustles or another tricks. Just pure flowing lines of very high prismatic hulls with a very interesting repartition of volumes. The drawing shows a very simple boat, just three hulls, 2 straight crossarms, and 2 appendices. It looks like a cheap beach trimaran.

During the crossing IDEC, Joyon (& Bernot) maintained an average speed of 26 knots, speed of 30 knots were reached several time a day. On June 11th he said to Charterworld: “The route won’t exactly be the Great Circle route, as I shall be sailing a little further south. But on the other hand that means I shall be avoiding the worst fogs around the Great Banks…” Fog, which has already engulfed IDEC in her first few miles of racing, forcing Francis Joyon to keep a close eye on the radar and over the bow of the boat. “I have just sailed between two whales. That was nice. They left me enough room to get through without having to manoeuvre…” 

What this article will pain to describe is the roaring wind, the waves, the bitting coald and the stress, the darkness of the night and all the noise. It won't describe either all those bumps and bruises, the permanent fear, the ten hours of sleep over five days...