Groupama 3 home

Fast turn-around necessary for Franck Cammas' team to go on stand-by again as soon as possible

Groupama 3 has made it back to France, making her homeport of Lorient at 2330 on Sunday night having taken 16 and a half days to make up the Atlantic from Cape Town. The 105ft maxi-trimaran was welcomed home by her skipper Franck Cammas. The Groupama team are now preparing the boat for a fresh attempt to on the Jules Verne Trophy starting whenever favourable conditions materialise from the start of January onward.

"The delivery trip went very smoothly with a crew made up of some excellent sailors, half of which are normally on Groupama 3," said Fred le Peutrec, who skippered the maxi-tri on her delivery back to France. "We've sailed well and I really appreciated the role of skipper, which requires you to take on a large amount of responsibility and to make decisions about what at times were difficult weather forecasts, particularly the last days. We're all delighted about making it home and seeing our families and children again to celebrate Christmas, which will certainly be joyful - albeit a little late".

Already the job list to be carried out over the next few days is taking shape in Franck Cammas' mind: "We're going to change the standing rigging as it's already covered over half a circumnavigation of the globe and it would be risky to keep it. We're also going to reinforce the floats down the centreline aft where the engineers have identified a weak point. The rest of the work will now focus on the smaller details due to the normal wear and tear after 16,000 miles on the water".

Meanwhile Cammas will be keeping an eye on the weather and a suitable pattern on which to leave. "We're closely monitoring the weather with Sylvain Mondon from Météo France. For the time being there is no weather window. So Fred (Le Peutrec), Ronan (Le Goff) and Jacco (Caraës), who all made the delivery trip aboard Groupama 3, will be able to get some rest before setting off around the world with the same crew as during our last attempt".

It seems very possible now given that their neighbours in Lorient, Banque Populaire have been on stand by since 15 November, that the two boats could set off around the world at around the same time. Pascal Bidegorry's mega-tri is currently up in Brest waiting for the stars to align.