Transat Café l'Or Start - 3 Trimarans Capsize in High Winds

The Transat Café L’or is one of the biggest events in world offshore sailing, especially in France, and this year there are 74 yachts with 148 skippers taking part in four classes: The Class 40 monohulls, the OCEAN50 trimarans, the IMOCA monohull yachts, which we know well from the Vendee Globe, and the mighty Ultim trimarans, which are capable of covering over 900 nautical miles in a day. The race starts from Le Havre in the Normandy region, before rounding a mark off Étretat, then heading out of the English Channel and into the Atlantic where the classes have a selection of courses, depending on their speed. The finish is in Fort-de-France, Martinique as the race traditionally follows the historic coffee trading route between France and Brazil. The race will take between 10 and 16 days, depending as always on weather conditions, with the Ultim course 6,200 nautical miles, the Ocean50 4,600 nautical miles, the IMOCA course 4,350 nautical miles, and the Class40 course at 3,750 nautical miles. The biggest talking point pre-race has been the weather and an approaching system in the Atlantic which is set to hit the fleet. The Ocean Fifty class and all its skippers requested to advance their start to Saturday which the race organisers agreed to, and the fleet of 50 foot trimarans started at 16:30 hours on Saturday 25th October. They are sailing down to the Canary Islands, leaving the entire archipelago to starboard. They will then head to Cape Verde, the original course marker, which they will leave to starboard. A waypoint could also be set to correspond to the planned race time of around twelve days. The Ultim, IMOCA and Class 40 fleets started as scheduled on Sunday. You can track the fleet at https://www.transatcafelor.org/en/cartography Thumbnail photo (c) Jean-Marie Liot / Alea #imoca #ultim #class40 #ocean50 #sailing