Bruno Peyron interview - pt2

The Race creator talks of plans for a new boat - this time for himself!

Continued from part 1 published yesterday...

Since the end of The Race Bruno Peyron has taken over the helm of second-placed Innovation Explorer from his brother Loick and has been racing her in Italy with Skip Novak, who was her co-skipper duringThe Race. He is currently looking for sponsors to continue campaigning her and his greatest desire in the short term is to line up against Olivier de Kersauson's new trimaran for another attempt on the Jules Verne Trophy. While in 1993 Peyron was the first to ever break the Jules Verne Trophy, de Kersauson is the current holder of the non-stop round the world record.

But Peyron gets almost more excited about what will follow this. Teaming up with designers Gilles Ollier & Associates again, he is looking at the possibility of building of a second generation maxi-multihull, perhaps a little longer than Club Med and her two sisterships at around 120ft LOA. "We would need to start building in July to September next year with a view to launching six month before the start [in Jan/Feb 2004]," he says.

After working through many many theoretical studies over whether a large catamaran is faster than a large tri prior to The Race, Ollier has gone back to the drawing board and resumed his research into this. Although Peyron's gut instinct remains that a cat is faster, de Kersauson's trimaran has clearly set his thought process in motion. "A trimaran is more expensive and heavier," he maintains. While Club Med weighed in at 17.5 tonnes, de Kersauson's tri is said to be just over 20. rg

He believes that the trio of Ollier cats will remain competitive. "One of the them will certainly be on the podium. The boats are not in the garbage after just one event. I don't think the gap [between the older Ollier cats and his new one] will be that high."

What is also interesting is that after many years of political in fighting de Kersauson is in Peyron's words "my new best friend! We are sharing the same spirit for the future of the class." Maybe they're just older. Provided Peyron raises adequate sponsorship he and de Kersauson may tackle records other than just the Jules Verne together. "Olivier is not aiming to play alone," he says. In addition to The Race and Jules Verne Trophy, there are all manner of records, from west to east transatlantic, Round Britain, New York-San Francisco, etc. He would like to create a schedule for these record attempts turning them into part of a circuit for the big multihulls, with a ranking system and world championship trophy.

Continued on page 2...