New US maxi-trimaran campaign

The Lending Club acquires the use of ex-Groupama 3/Banque Populaire VII

Renaud Laplanche and Ryan Breymaier have teamed up for a brand new ocean  racing and record breaking program starting in 2015 aboard the 103ft long former Groupama 3/Banque Populaire VII trimaran Lending Club 2.

Laplanche and Breymaier met for the first time racing on John Sangmeister’s 77ft trimaran Tritium Racing, renamed Lending Club for the 2013 Transpac race to Hawaii where they won the race, but missed the course record by just two hours.

On discovering a common vision of sailing and ocean racing, discussions ensued between Laplanche and Breymaier and before departing Hawaii, they both knew they would be back together for the long term. Throughout 2014 they worked on putting together a program that would make 2015 a record-­‐breaking year.

Breymeier was tasked with sourcing a boat and, with Laplanche’s support and advice, they negotiated the charter of the maxitrimaran from its new owner (believed to be Francis Joyon) for the 2015 summer season.

2010 was a major year for this trimaran when, as Groupama 3, Franck Cammas and his crew sailed it around the world non-stop in a record time of  48 days 7 hours 44 minutes and 52 seconds, earning them the Jules Verne Trophy. During the summer the boat was put into a singlehanded configuration, fitted with a new cut-down rig ready for that year's Route du Rhum, which Cammas went on to win. This Loick Peyron repeated with the boat under new owner and rechristened Banque Populaire VII for last autumn's singlehanded race from St Malo to Guadeloupe. 

As Lending Club and with a fully crewed program ahead of them, Lending Club will be fitted with her originally larger rig. The team is currenlty working with the yacht's designers VPLP on this conversion.

Lending Club 2 is due to be launched in Lorient in less than two weeks when the team will commence training. While named Lending Club 2, the program is fully funded by Laplanche personally, he and Breymaier will race as co-­skippers and helmsmen. To sail with them they have selected an international crew comprising of highly experienced French talent such as sailmaker Jean-­Baptiste Le Vaillant and former IMOCA 60/MOD70 skipper Roland Jourdain plus rising star USA sailors Jan Majer and Skip MacCormack and German shorthanded Boris Herrmann, who competed in the last Barcelona World Race with Breymeier. Wouter Verbraak will be in charge of shoreside weather routing.

The 2015 program includes a series of record attempts taking the team to the UK, France and to both the east and west coasts of the USA, including Newport, New York and San Francisco.