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Displaying items by tag: Discovery Route

#WorldRecord - Six days, 14 hours, 29 minutes and 21 seconds: that's the new time to beat after the crew of Spindrift 2 smashed the previous Discovery route record by more than 20 hours.

The world's largest racing trimaran crossed the finish line at San Salvador in the Bahamas in the early hours of yesterday morning (6 November) after a blisteringly fast Atlantic crossing from Cadiz in Spain.

Reaching speeds of up to 46.08 knots and covering more than 714 miles last Friday 1 November alone, it was expected that the vessel skippered by Dona Bertarelli and Yann Guichard would make an impact.

But even rough seas and technical mishaps going into the final stretch didn't put much of a dent in their incredible margin, almost a full day ahead of the time set by previous record holder Groupama 3 in 2007.

And this amazing achievement will surely erase memories of Spindrift's woes in Dublin Bay over the summer.

"This is huge," said Bertarelli after confirmation of their record. "The emotion was waiting for us the moment we crossed the line. I enjoyed this race a lot; my first crossing of the Atlantic, in a race, for a record, with a good result at the end.

"Any doubts I might have had about this boat have gone. It is an extraordinary machine, and was combined with a great crew, following superb preparation made by the team on the ground and a sound choice of route."

Published in Offshore

#WorldRecord - The world's largest racing trimaran is on standby awaiting the right weather window to launch their attempt at the Discovery route world record.

Spindrift 2 - the successor to the trimaran skippred by Yann Guichard that met an unfortunate fate in Dun Laoghaire this summer - has been in Portimao in Portugal since 7 October waiting for the perfect conditions to mount their challenge on the Discovery route from Cadiz in southwestern Spain to San Salvador in the Bahamas.

The record for the near 4,000 nautical mile transatlantic route is currently held by Groupama 3, a Franck Cammass-skippered vessel that's part of the same team that won the Volvo Ocean Race in Galway in 2012.

Groupama 3 set a record time of seven days, 10 hours, 58 minutes and 53 seconds with an average speed of 21.7 knots in May 2007, beating the previous time set by Steve Fossett's PlayStation by almost two whole days.

Meanwhile, Guichard and co-skipper Dona Bertarelli, last seen in action in the Rolex Fastnet Race, will be waiting for the trade winds to pick up pace and the Azores high pressure system into place creating the optimum conditions to set out from Cadiz.

"Once we have rounded the Canary Islands by the right it will be a matter of fine tuning our strategy and choosing the best possible course to join San Salvador," saus Guichard.

"The options are a more northerly course, closer to the direct route, or a more southerly course, further off the direct course but presenting better conditions."

Follow the team on Twitter @spindriftracing for the latest Discovery route news.

Published in Offshore

Coastal Notes Coastal Notes covers a broad spectrum of stories, events and developments in which some can be quirky and local in nature, while other stories are of national importance and are on-going, but whatever they are about, they need to be told.

Stories can be diverse and they can be influential, albeit some are more subtle than others in nature, while other events can be immediately felt. No more so felt, is firstly to those living along the coastal rim and rural isolated communities. Here the impact poses is increased to those directly linked with the sea, where daily lives are made from earning an income ashore and within coastal waters.

The topics in Coastal Notes can also be about the rare finding of sea-life creatures, a historic shipwreck lost to the passage of time and which has yet many a secret to tell. A trawler's net caught hauling more than fish but cannon balls dating to the Napoleonic era.

Also focusing the attention of Coastal Notes, are the maritime museums which are of national importance to maintaining access and knowledge of historical exhibits for future generations.

Equally to keep an eye on the present day, with activities of existing and planned projects in the pipeline from the wind and wave renewables sector and those of the energy exploration industry.

In addition Coastal Notes has many more angles to cover, be it the weekend boat leisure user taking a sedate cruise off a long straight beach on the coast beach and making a friend with a feathered companion along the way.

In complete contrast is to those who harvest the sea, using small boats based in harbours where infrastructure and safety poses an issue, before they set off to ply their trade at the foot of our highest sea cliffs along the rugged wild western seaboard.

It's all there, as Coastal Notes tells the stories that are arguably as varied to the environment from which they came from and indeed which shape people's interaction with the surrounding environment that is the natural world and our relationship with the sea.