Vendee Globe: New IMOCA60 foiler Apivia is launched at Lorient
by Richard Gladwell/Sail-World.com/nz 6 Aug 2019 14:44 NZST
6 August 2019
While the sailing world collectively scratches its head over the images and concepts behind the latest Hugo Boss launched in Gosport, over the Channel at Lorient, Charlie Dalin, a naval architect and shorthanded solo skipper, with four podium places on the Solitaire du Figaro has launched a new IMOCA60 Apivia.
Sailing an IMOCA60 he finished third overall on the podium of the two-handed Jacques Vabre Transat in 2015.
He has teamed up with Apivia Mutuelle, part of Groupe Macif for a racing program starting now to 2022. The sailing team is Apivia Voile.
Apivia is a design collaboration between Dalin and his team and esteemed French designer Guillaume Verdier. New Zealand based Pure Design and Engineering, did much of the structural engineering. The IMOCA60 is a development of the work that was going to become the Volvo Super 60.
Apivia is a more conservative, conventional hull design than Hugo Boss, which to some eyes could be a step too far on the uncertain route taken by foiling short-handed trans-oceanic IMOCA60's. In the 2017 Jacques Vabre Transat, six foilers started the race and only one finished, and it was a conventional IMOCA60 which led that group home.
Apivia shows off her foils, which Hugo Boss was not prepared to do at her launch. In this regard Apivia is anything but conservative.
The key with the foiling IMOCA60's would still seem to be knowing when to push with the foiling and when to throttle back. Clearly delaying that later moment could be the race winning factor.
The upcoming Jacques Vabre Transat, which will be the first test for many of the Vendee Globe teams, gets underway on October 27, 2019 has attracted 67 teams with 134 sailors in the Class40, Multi50 and IMOCA60, over a course of 4,350nm from Le Harve to Brazil.