Gitana on a diet

Major surgery being carried out to Lionel Lemonchois' 60ft trimaran

The Rothschild 60ft trimaran Gitana X is currently undergoing major surgery at her base in the Multipôle 56 in La Trinité-sur-Mer. A major weight saving regime is underway prior to her participation in November's the two-haanded Transat Jacques Vabre where she will be sailed by Lionel Lemonchois and Marc Guessard.

Immediately after the Grand Prix de Fécamp at the end of August, Gitana returned to her base where her mast was unstepped and she was hauled out and put into the shed.
All the Gitana Team team have been working flat out to remove all the gear from her cockpit as quickly as possible in order to cut away her 'ears'. These extensions stick out on either side of the central cockpit’s aft helming station are where the headsail winches and the fairlead tracks are currently located.

Once these were removed the work began rebuilding of the cockpit. "Lionel (Lemonchois) has redesigned the cockpit to optimise the repositioning of the gear and to enable headsails to be trimmed more effectively," explained Yann Marilley. "It’s a big job which will keep us busy through to the end of September. As for the laminate work, we have been working non-stop for a whole week, the team working in shifts to keep going night and day. Once this stage has been completed, all of the winch transmissions need to be overhauled adding a winch to the general coupling system…"

Setting aside the improved efficiency in manoeuvring, this operation will save an estimated 80 kilos in weight.

Losing weight has become a leitmotiv within the Gitana Team. While the laminators were working on the structure, Olivier Wrosczynski was carrying out major changes to the on-board computers. The two original computers have been removed in favour of a single watertight unit (which can take the connection of all equipment), and a back-up laptop PC. He has also worked on improving the boat’s autopilot which will have improved performance software. "Until now, we’ve used the automatic pilot as a course-holding instrument. It is much better to be able to use it in 'intelligent mode' to follow the true wind variations. Once she is back on the water, we’ll have lots of trials to carry out; particularly sea trials so that the automatic pilot gets used to the boat, so that it records the trimaran’s behaviour in order to be more reactive and as efficient as possible…"

Gitana’s relaunch is scheduled to take place on 6 October, with the aim of sailing as much as possible before setting out for Le Havre, where she must be by Friday 24 October at 10h00 GMT.

Training
As skipper Lionel Lemonchois is in south Brittany overseeing the modifications to the trimaran, his co-skipper for the Transat Jacques Vabre, Marc Guessard, is busy racing a Figaro class' two handed race to Dakar with Franck-Yves Escoffier. At the time of writing, he was lying 3rd as the fleet rounded Cap Finisterre (north-western tip of Spain), just 4 miles behind the leader. This two-handed offshore race is perfectly suited to his preparation for the Transat Jacques Vabre.