Sam Goodchild and Ned Collier Wakefield, the young Britons who were leading the Transat Jacques Vabre Class 40 race this morning have confirmed that they are retiring from the biennial race from Le Havre to Costa Rica.
They have been forced out of the race with structural damage to the port side of the hull of their Class 40 yacht, discovering a crack on the internal skin of the laminate which was threatening to let in water early this morning. They were 130 miles to the north of the Azores. After lying second since the race started last Wednesday off the French port, the duo whose average age is just 22, had only just taken the lead this morning.
Contacted at 1115hrs CET 1015 UTC/GMT this morning, Goodchild, 21, said:
“At the moment we have the mainsail down and have the staysail up. We are heading downwind towards the Azores. We have got a crack along the port side which is from slamming through the waves for the last two days, so we are trying to be careful not to do any more and make sure it is not getting any worse. At the moment there is no water ingress but we feel that is not too far away.”
“We realised this about an hour and when we were on a watch change I went to hang up my foul weather gear I saw it I saw it, I found the crack then.”
“It is pretty devastating. This race is something we have been both looking forward to for such a long time. It has been my dream for so long, so then to take the start and to be in a position we never imagined we would be in, second for most of the first week and then overtaking last night, it kind of rubs it in a bit more and makes it a bit more devastating. But at the same time we can go home not feeling too annoyed with ourselves. We put up a good fight and made good calls, not too many mistakes and that’s it.
“I don’t think we are going to be able to make a repair. The boat is going to need to come out of the water and have boat builders work on it, it is cracked on the inner skin and so I don’t think a repair is realistic in the short space of time.”
“The conditions last night were pretty rough there was not as much wind as the first front but the seas were a lot rougher. And we had a moon which did help us to avoid slamming as much as we could, because I think it is the constant slamming which did the damage.”
“It is not easy. We were hoping to continue the same way and there was just that one storm to get through and things were looking like it was going to get a bit better, a bit easier. So we can hold our heads high and hopefully come back next time and have a go it again.”
From Transat Jacques Vabre
Credit : A Courcoux
They have been forced out of the race with structural damage to the port side of the hull of their Class 40 yacht, discovering a crack on the internal skin of the laminate which was threatening to let in water early this morning. They were 130 miles to the north of the Azores. After lying second since the race started last Wednesday off the French port, the duo whose average age is just 22, had only just taken the lead this morning.
Contacted at 1115hrs CET 1015 UTC/GMT this morning, Goodchild, 21, said:
“At the moment we have the mainsail down and have the staysail up. We are heading downwind towards the Azores. We have got a crack along the port side which is from slamming through the waves for the last two days, so we are trying to be careful not to do any more and make sure it is not getting any worse. At the moment there is no water ingress but we feel that is not too far away.”
“We realised this about an hour and when we were on a watch change I went to hang up my foul weather gear I saw it I saw it, I found the crack then.”
“It is pretty devastating. This race is something we have been both looking forward to for such a long time. It has been my dream for so long, so then to take the start and to be in a position we never imagined we would be in, second for most of the first week and then overtaking last night, it kind of rubs it in a bit more and makes it a bit more devastating. But at the same time we can go home not feeling too annoyed with ourselves. We put up a good fight and made good calls, not too many mistakes and that’s it.
“I don’t think we are going to be able to make a repair. The boat is going to need to come out of the water and have boat builders work on it, it is cracked on the inner skin and so I don’t think a repair is realistic in the short space of time.”
“The conditions last night were pretty rough there was not as much wind as the first front but the seas were a lot rougher. And we had a moon which did help us to avoid slamming as much as we could, because I think it is the constant slamming which did the damage.”
“It is not easy. We were hoping to continue the same way and there was just that one storm to get through and things were looking like it was going to get a bit better, a bit easier. So we can hold our heads high and hopefully come back next time and have a go it again.”
From Transat Jacques Vabre
