It’s a Long Way To Go For a Dark & Stormy!

4th November 2018 will see the start of the single handed Route Du Rhum sailing race starting from St. Malo in Brittany, Northern France. Over 125 boats will make their way across the pond to Guadeloupe in the Caribbean, to presumably escape the onset of a European winter! Run every 4 years, this famous race is now in it’s 40th year having started in 1978.

 

Our sister company Solent Rib Charter will be at the event with 13 of our Ribs and some of our staff in support of race teams and to entertain their corporate and invited guests out on the water for the race start. We are hoping for mild temperatures and some sunshine please!

Two entries that we’ll be cheering on in particular will be UK entries from Alex Thomson aboard his new Open 60, Hugo Boss and Sam Davies also in the Open 60 ‘IMOCA’ class with her yacht Initiatives – Cour.  We wish them both fair winds and safe passage. 

 

Course records for this 3542 nautical mile race were smashed in the last edition of the race in 2014 by Loick Peron in his multi-hull taking just 7 days 15 hours and 8 minutes. Francois Gabart also broke the mono-hull record in a time of  12 days 4 hours and 38 minutes. With foiling technology romping forward at literally a rate of knots, we could see these times destroyed if the conditions are right in this edition of the race…