A large area of lighter winds and calms currently developing around the Canary Islands may hamper the closing speeds of the Mini Transat fleet as they near the finish of their 1350-mile race from La Rochelle through this weekend and beyond writes W M Nixon.

But this morning the leaders are well offshore from Portugal, streaming towards the southwest in a good line of northeast winds. Inshore towards Portugal, however, lighter wind may emerge today, but the leading group out at sea are hoping to carry their brisk favourable winds well south before they have to consider how best to deal with the developing situation towards the finish.

Their slow progress out of the Bay of Biscay at the beginning of the week since Sunday’s start may make estimates of seven days to reach Las Palmas in the Canaries optimistic. But at the moment, leader Remi Aubrun is past the halfway stage, and is making 9.8 knots with 793 miles to go to the finish, while the consistent Erwan Le Draoulec in second is less than two miles astern at the same speed, with Yannick Le Clech third and Clarisse Cremer fourth.

Ireland’s Tom Dolan has made a remarkable recovery from his setback at the start when – having been in the lead - he’d to re-trace his steps in exceptionally poor visibility to round a mandatory turning point. This very briefly had him back in last place in the 56-strong Production class, but he has now milled his way up to 14th, an astonishing achievement, and is currently battling with top star Pierre Chedeville.

As expected, though, the benefits of being first out of the Bay of Biscay to enjoy the strong favourable winds down towards Cape Finisterre ahead of all rivals gave the leading group an enormous boost, and they’re currently sitting on a lead of around 40 to 50 miles on the Dolan/Chedeville group.

But the possibility of erratic wind patterns over a wide area at the Canaries could upset the rankings. In times past, major events of the calibre of the Vendee Globe and the Volvo Ocean Race have seen major place changes while negotiating the passage through or round the islands, and the fact that the Mini Transat fleet have to reach a finish line in the heart of the islands further increases the challenge.

Meanwhile Mini Transat life continues to inter-act with the outside world. There was a sweet moment on Tuesday when the Mini Transat organisers contacted Tom Dolan’s girl-friend Karen to wish her a happy birthday and confirm that he was working his way up through the fleet in the trademark style of the “Flying Irishman” – l’Irlandais Volant.

Race tracker here

 

Ireland’s solo sailor Tom Dolan and the other contenders in the leading group in the Mini Transat have finally been able to start exiting the Bay of Biscay at better speeds this morning as new east to nor’east winds have finally set in writes W M Nixon. And once they’ve finally emerged into the open Atlantic to shape a course down Spain’s west coast and on towards Portugal, speeds should become very impressive as the famed and favourable “Portuguese trades” do the business.

But talk of a “leading group” is a very loose term, for although there are dozens of the 56 competitors astern of Dolan – some of them very far indeed behind him – he in turn got on the wrong side of a gate mark and also the wrong side of a couple of shifts during the very frustrating beat from La Rochelle’s Sunday start. However, his regular sparring partners Erwan Le Draoulac and Clarisse Cremer, together with Remi Aubrun and Yannick Le Clech, seemed to know exactly when it was right to transfer to the to the north of the rhumb line in order to be first to avail of the long-forecast but slow-to-arrive change in wind direction.

Let’s just get started….Erwan Le Draoulec, Francois Jambou and Tom Dolan in the pre-Mini Transat shoreside stage

As it is, Dolan had been doing very well in steadily working his way up through the fleet from a very frustrating first 24 hours. He’d been leading in the early stages, but after realizing in the very poor visibility that he’d missed that gate mark, he had to take the medicine and go a seriously long way back to have him re-start in 54th place. But then he put in some really hard work, and by Tuesday he was being recorded as around 12th to 14th overall in the Production Boat (Serie) Division, at distances of between 9 and 12 miles behind the leaders.

But last night, with the leading group in the area off the majestic Cabo Ortegal, the final and definitive wind change arrived. Yet it did so very unevenly, and stretched out the front runners, with the leaders being most favoured. This morning Erwan Le Draoulac and Remi Aubrun are neck and neck in the lead, crossing the bay off La Coruna, and making between 8 and 10 knots with Yannick Le Clech and Clarisse Cremer 2.1 and 3.3 miles behind respectively, but logging similar speeds.

This leading foursome have got very clear away, as fourth-placed Ambrogio Beccarria is all of 14 miles behind the two front runners. And this tendency to stretch the margins the further you go down the fleet is reflected in Tom Dolan’s location, for though he’s currently on 8.8 knots, and on track speeding past Cabo Ortegal well offshore, he’s lying 17th in class and is 30 miles behind the leaders.

Running hard in the Portuguese Trades is demanding of boats and sailors, but Tom Dolan has shown he can thrive in such sailing in times past – he’ll be looking forward to it. And now at least, the sun shines, and the horrible headwinds and miserable rain of the first day are a very faded memory.

After sunshine the day before, Sunday;s start was in dispiriting condtions. Tom Dolan (IRL 910) pacing with Jerome Lhermiette (FR 891)Race tracker here

Irish Sailing President Jack Roy was on hand in Bassin des Chalutiers, La Rochelle today to wish sole Irish entry Tom Dolan good luck in tomorrow's Mini Transat Race start.

An eve of race Irish reception with the Cultural & Sporting Attache from the Irish Embassy was held in the National Yacht Club sailor's honour. Roy was among a number of Irish sailors in France to wish the intrepid County Meath sailor the very best for his Transatlantic Race ambitions.  

Dolan's aim is a podium place, and he has been on that podium or near it in almost every race this past summer. But now it’s down to the moment of truth tomorrow, to race the 1,350 miles to Gran Canaria, about a week of sailing following which there’s a pause while they wait for the current very vigorous hurricane season to end, and then they race the 2,700 miles Transatlantic miles to Le Marin in Martinique.

Read Afloat's Mini Transat Race preview with a special focus on Tom Dolan by W M Nixon here.

Ireland’s Tom Dolan had improved his position to fourth in class when the 55-stong Mini Transat Class had a close finish in the 220 mile Marie-Agnes Peron Trophy race at Douarnenez during the night writes W M Nixon. While he may have missed a coveted podium place, his continuing competitiveness in recovering placings in such an intense fleet - at one stage he was back in ninth - show that the Meathman is still very much on the pace, and following the planned preparation track towards the Mini Transat in October.

Tracker here:

Irish solo sailor Tom Dolan is back in contention tomorrow in France in the shortest race in the countdown to the Mini Transat in October writes W M Nixon. But although the Trophee MAP from Douarnenez south to Ile de Groix before returning outside Birvideaux Lighthous and the Chausee de Seine is “only” 220 miles long, Dolan is under double pressure as he is defending the title. Plus, as he wryly remarks, 220 miles is too short to allow any viable short-sleep pattern to develop - in fact, he may be awake throughout a race which involves some very tricky pilotage.

A challenging course. With its varied navigational demands and occasional bursts of intense pilotage, the 220-mile Trophee MAP race which starts tomorrow in Douarnenez and finishes there within two days is “just long enough to get you exhausted but not long enough to develop a viable sleep-snatch pattern”.

Following his second overall (after leading for much of the race) in the 500-mile Mini-en-Mai which finished at La Trinite on May 12th, his supporters at home and in France have been beavering away to provide a more solid sponsorship support basis. It’s going the right way, so much so that today Tom’s Pogo 610 offshoresailing.fr (IRL 910) will have the Smurfit Kappa logo affixed to her mainsail.

Course tracker here:

Currently Dolan is third in the ranking in the hotly-contested class, as early season winner Pierre Chedeville (887) continues to lead, while Mini-en-Mai winner Erwan le Draoulec has moved into second. As for the race itself, with strong sou’westers forecast the fleet is under no illusions about the conditions they’ll face, with rough tough fast reaching needing constant attention. As Tom says: “It’ll be pockets stuffed with energy bars and a thermos filled with Barry’s strongest tea to see who can stay awake the longest”. Yet even in the midst of all his last-minute preparations for a rugged race, he still found the time to pass on his best wishes to fellow-Irish lone sailor Coner Fogerty, slugging into it out in the Atlantic in the OSTAR in his Sunfast 3600 Bam.

These MiniTransat skippers are a breed apart – this post-race group of four includes the three current top rankers: No 1 Pierre Chedeville (left), No 2 Erwan le Draoulec (second right), and No 3 Tom Dolan (right)

Ireland will be represented by  County Meath sailor Tom Dolan in this year's Mini–transat, the race, that organisers say, remains, by far, the most international of single handed races. For the fortieth anniversary of the Mini Transat, there are no fewer than fourteen nationalities set to be represented at the start. In total, thirty racers from overseas will be competing, which equates to a little over a third of the overall line-up.

The fact remains that the Mini Transat, far from being a French preserve, has always attracted overseas applicants, far beyond the usual frontiers of solo offshore racing. Must it be repeated that from the second edition, it was a sailor from the US, Norton Smith, who dominated proceedings? Since the first edition of the Mini Transat, 13 overseas sailors have secured a podium finish. Our minds naturally turn to the Swiss sailors Laurent Bourgnon (2nd in 1987), Yvan Bourgnon (winner in 1995) and Bernard Stamm (3rd in 1995). We must add to this list the Polish sailor Kazimir Jaworski, 2nd in 1977 for the first edition of the race and New Zealander Chris Sayer, 3rd in 1999, aboard a prototype built in his native country. Certain overseas sailors have gone on to become stars of offshore racing, such as Britons Ellen MacArthur and Sam Davies. In Spain too, the Mini Transat has served as a springboard for sailors of the calibre of Alex Pella, winner of the Route du Rhum 2014 in Class40 as well as Anna Corbella, who is returning to the 2017 edition after completing two editions of the Barcelona World Race. In fact, the vitality of the Mini Class in southern Europe is evidenced by the fact that Italy and Spain make up the largest contingents of overseas sailors.

Below recent clips of Tom Dolan in action onboard 910:

This is the "Flying Irishman" Tom Dolan in France - he's currently training for the single-handed trans Atlantic Mini Transat race pic.twitter.com/TnmHRRUbud

— Irish Sailing (@Irish_Sailing) May 30, 2017

It really is one of the special features of the Mini Transat that it calls to sailors from right around the globe. All the way from the Antipodes, New Zealand and Australian sailors have come to do battle. Similarly, several Japanese and Chinese skippers have started out in the Mini, before returning to their home countries to spread the word about the wonders of the race. On the other side of the pond, the arrival destination is inevitably involved in the race too. In this way, for several editions now, we have seen entries from the West Indies. This year, Guadeloupe will be represented once again by Keni Piperol, at the helm of a prototype that was sailed by Italian sailor Michele Zambelli in 2015. Clearly, the Mini knows no bounds.

The nationalities taking the start in 2017
France – Estonia (1) – Switzerland (3) – Italy (7) – Ireland (1) – Belgium (1) – Spain (6) – Germany (4) – Holland (1) – Czech Republic (1) – Croatia (1) – Australia (1) – United Arab Emirates (1) – UK (1)

After the accelerating build-up to Olympic Medal success throughout the summer of 2016, there was hope in some sections of the Irish sailing community that the mood of 2017 might be different in pace. Tokyo 2020 still seemed very far away to everyone except the most dedicated Olympians. There appeared to be a feeling that 2017 should be the year for everyone else, and particularly for those who yearned for a less competitive enjoyment of boats and sailing. W M Nixon takes stock.

Once upon a time, we had seasons. Sailing wasn’t 12 months of the year, let alone 24/7. On the contrary, there were the rare old times of Opening Days and Closing Days (we’re talking annual sailing programmes here, not pubs), and Launching Suppers and Hauling Up Suppers and whatever, and not a sail to be seen at Christmas except for the rare oddball whose very rarity underlined the unusual nature of such a sight in the dead of winter.

But now we have wetsuits, and the effectively year-round programme at many sailing centres – in my own club at Howth, for instance, it has been continuous since April 1974 thanks to that Autumn’s introduction of the Frostbite series for the then new-fangled Lasers. And if you’re not actually out sailing yourself, there’s the means of keeping up with those who are, a classic case being the following of the tracker for this past week’s 500-mile Mini-en-Mai race by Tom Dolan, which had certain goggle-eyed adherents clicking-in at ungodly hours of the night to see how our man was doing.

It was a race being sailed at a flat-out pace and a level of concentration - despite a sleep-deprived physical and mental state – beyond the comprehension of most of the rest of us. Good luck to those who feel drawn to it personally, and can do it. But today, there’s an ISORA race from Holyhead to Dun Laoghaire under way that is catering for all levels of involvement and commitment, and it has attracted a worthwhile starting line-up of 31 boats, encouraged by the welcoming efforts of ISORA Commodore Peter Ryan and his team.

Holyhead Harbour as sailing people know it – not as a utilitarian ferry port, but as a pleasant corner called Porth-y-Fellyn where there’s a sailing club, marina and boatyard

The word on the waterfront is that hyper-racers – people who expect three or four windward/leeward races per day at an intensely-run regatta – tend to dismiss this growing contemporary trend back towards classic Irish Sea Offshore Racing Association courses as sailing for people who can’t hack it in the frequent cut-and-thrust of artificial courses. But that’s to take a “one size fits all” attitude to sailing. If there’s one indisputable feature about our sometimes very odd sport, it’s the variety of the people involved in it – and that’s before you even consider the different type of boats.

On top of that, not only are there people who can get all their sailing enjoyment without needing to race at all, but there are grades of dedication in competition in sailing. This was particularly apparent a couple of years ago down at Dromineer on Lough Derg, when classes of Dragons, Flying Fifteens and Squibs descended on the place for the annual end-of-season Freshwater Challenge in October.

Top Squibs from all over Ireland gearing themselves up for two days of intensive racing at Dromineer. But it emerged that for many of the local fleet, they weren’t into this sort of thing at all. Photo: Gareth Craig

There was an impressive fleet of top Squibs from all over Ireland out racing like fury on the lake. But there was also a substantial number of local Squibs that stayed in their berths. And it emerged that they hadn’t even entered the event in the first place. It seems that the Dromineer Squibs had been bought by people who saw them as handy and surprisingly comfortable little boats in which you could take the children, or more likely the grandchildren, out for a fun sail. And maybe you and a friend could do the occasional gentle summer’s evening club race for a bit of sociability. But the idea of committing to a frantic weekend of top competition was anathema.

Now while we’re not suggesting that the 31 boats which will be starting this morning in the ISORA Holyhead to Howth Race include a significant sector which are anti-competition, nevertheless there’s a distinctly relaxed atmosphere in some of the fleet in the knowledge that their abilities will be recognized by the use of Progressive ECHO handicap in tandem with the ruthless calculations of IRC.

The Number-Cruncher-in-Chief, Denis Kiely of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association, set to during the winter in his lair in Kinsale and ran the figures from all last year’s ISORA racing through his mincer to come up with an ECHO handicap (which is performance based) for boats of all kinds, and these figures were available to get things going this year.

The Irish National Sailing School’s keelboat fleet includes (left to right) the Reflex 38 Lynx, the Elan Beaufort, and the J/109 Jedi which is doing today’s cross-channel race.
Thus we find that a boat like the Kenneth Rumball-skippered J/109 Jedi from the Irish National Sailing School in Dun Laoghaire is racing today on an IRC of 1.010 while her ECHO is 1.075, but against that the majestic Nicholson 58 Rebellion (John Hughes) has an IRC of 1.056, but her ECHO is only 0.999.

With Progressive ECHO, it’s a flexible figure which encourages regular participation, for if you’ve had a bad day at the races, next time out you’ll find your Progressive ECHO has progressed even further southwards.

It all seems too gentle to be worth even thinking about by those whose every thought is competitive. But for those who enjoy settling down for a long haul at sea, with the opportunity to test boat and crew in the gentlest possible manner against other craft, it all has a certain appeal.

The fleet in today’s race shows interesting comparisons between IRC and Progressive ECHO handicaps. Some have not made the line, including the veteran ketch Maybird, but a late addition not listed is the Sunfast 3600 Bam (Conor Fogerty)
And it will be interesting on several levels, for not only have we boats of a definite cruiser-orientation whose crews are going along because ISORA has gone out of its way to offer the alternative of a developing handicap system which might reward their efforts, but up at the sharp end of the fleet there’ll be some very interesting performance comparisons to be made between hot boats as they race in what looks likely to be quite brisk conditions.

Given a chance, she’ll fly – Neal Eatough’s Forty Shades is an M-Tec Open 40.

The expectation is of a fresh to strong sou’westerly which mercifully will back during the day to free the fleet up to lay the course to Dublin Bay, in fact it might free them so much that one of the more interesting newcomers, Neal Eatough’s Open 40 M-Tec Forty Shades, could be across in half a day.

Another boat which will revel in a freeing breeze is Conor Fogerty’s Sunfast 3600 Bam – the Howth skipper is doing it two-handed with clubmate Robert Slator, and he sees the forecast weather pattern as providing them with a real chance.

Conor Fogerty’s successful Sunfast 3600 Bam! – a class winner in the RORC Caribbean 600 2016 – is a late entry, and he’ll be doing the race two-handed with Robert Slator

Inevitably the smart money will be on Paul O’Higgins’ JPK 10.80 Rockabill VI, but with no less than six J/109s in the mix, there’ll always be at least one potent representative of this hot class ready to pounce if there’s the slightest let-up in the pace on the JPK 10.80.

One of these J/109s is of course Stephen Tudor’s defending ISORA Overall Champion Sgrech from Pwllheli, a boat which is the very personification of ISORA’s cross-channel community, as her regular crew includes ISORA Commodore Peter Ryan, who is also a former Commodore of the National YC.

Paul O'Higgins JPK 10.80 Rockabill VI is one of the favourites for IRC success. Photo Afloat.ie

As anyone who has ever sailed on one of the Pwllheli boats will know, there’s always a smattering of Welsh spoken among the crew. Aboard Sgrech, says Peter, they speak little else except when they want to curse and swear, when they’ll tell you – with solemn faces – that there are no swear words in Welsh.

“Somehow we understand each other,” says Peter, “but Welsh is so different – not just from English, but from Irish too – that you could sail regularly with them for 45 years and still know very little of this strange tongue that they talk away in all the time”.

Perhaps it’s the underlying camaraderie of the sea which enables the communicational oddity which is Sgrech to be so effective, but then too, the shared enthusiasm of Stephen Tudor and Peter Ryan is infectious, and sometimes it spreads to the entire fleet.

Sgrech at full chat. When you’re sailing like this and something goes wrong, then you really do know if there are no swear words in Welsh....

Thus the Commodore of ISORA expected a bit of a party in Holyhead Sailing Club last night notwithstanding the prospect of a windward slug first thing this morning (start was at 0800hrs today, there’s a tracker) and equally, with everyone energised by the day’s freeing wind (DV), he confidently anticipates an even more boisterous gathering in the National tonight.

Welcome home. The National Yacht Club will be the venue for tonight’s post-race party.

The ghost of the great John Illingworth, who did so much for the development of offshore racing in the 1940s, ’50s ’60s and ’70s, would approve, as he thought an offshore race without a good party beforehand and an even better one afterwards was not really a proper offshore race at all. That said, Illingworth’s most famous boat, Myth of Malham, was notorious for her paucity of cleats. When a newcomer to the crew demanded to know where he should cleat the headsails, an old hand told him they didn’t cleat the headsail sheets in the masthead cutter rig, as they trimmed the sails all the time....

Myth of Malham. John Illingworth’s double Fastnet Race overall winner was renowned for her shortage of cleats.

In today’s cross-channel dash, I’ve no doubt there’ll be many boats where sheets are cleated while crews settle down to enjoy the satisfaction of the boat trimmed reasonably well and making progress without the prospect of having to make a lot of irritating tacks before the finish. It’s different strokes for different folks.

Earlier this week I found myself studying a boat which is about as different from what your average ISORA racer expects in a boat as is humanly possible. This is Ian Lipinski’s 8.65 metres Griffon which took overall line honours in the 500-mile Mini-en-Mai at La Trinite at 0508hrs Irish time yesterday morning.

It would be a day’s work for a crew of five to race her- yet Ian Lipinski sails his odd-looking and demanding Proto, the 8.65 metres Griffon, single-handed and he wins too.

Griffon is the current pace-setter in the Proto section (prototypes in other words), and she’s a veritable floating laboratory for every development imaginable, including being at the forefront in the testing of foils. Obviously she’s also showing an aversion to that traditional notion of sweetly hollow waterlines forward, as exemplified by the schooner America. And if you dismiss her forward hull shape as being like a Dutch barge, next time you’re near an International Dragon, take a look at her forward waterlines – you might be surprised.

But the thing that really strikes me about Griffon is the number of tasks that the lone skipper has to perform all on his own to keep this machine at optimum performance. The sailplan alone is a 24/7 challenge, and rig optimization is part of it. Add in two daggerboards whose deployment offers multiple choices. Then you must never forget the ideal positioning of the canting keel in ever-changing circumstances. All that done, you still have to sail and navigate the boat. And if on top of all that you can find time to fire off visual and verbal communications with shore and sponsors, joy is unconfined....

Contrast that with the mood that might prevail aboard one of the heftier and more luxurious contenders in today’s Holyhead-Dun Laoghaire. The boat is nicely in trim, and it’s up to the helmsman to keep her there, and if it’s the autohelm as is now permitted, so be it. Alert as ever, the crew noticed a useful backing of the wind a while back, and sheets were adjusted accordingly and then cleated home. My word, but we’re racing keenly. And can that clock really be right? If so, it’s time for Nooners...

Ireland’s Tom Dolan is continuing to set the pace in his Mini Pogo 3 Offshoresailing.fr (IRL 910) in the 500 miles Mini-en-Mai as the leaders sweep past the Iles des Glenans and on towards the Point de Penmarch in a brisk easterly, vying for the lead in the Mini 650 class with sister-ship Kerhis-Cerfrance (Tanguy Bouroullec) at speeds of between 10 and 12 knots writes W M Nixon

With the first night drawing on, they have interesting navigation and pilotage in prospect as the course takes them close along the land inside the Ile de Sein and north to a turn up towards Camaret, before heading southwest into open Atlantic and the most westerly turn in the race, following which there’s the long offshore haul southeast towards a turn off Royan, then it’s back along the land to return to La Trinite sur Mer.

The pace has been ferocious, but with slacker winds in prospect as the race moves along, it’s still a very long way to the finish in these smallest offshore racers sailing what is undoubtedly a big boys’ race.

See Tracker below: 

Sole Irish Mini Transat sailor Thomas Dolan of County Meath starts his solo–sailing season tomorrow in a double–handed Lorient Bretagne Sud Mini race. 

Racing will get underway officially on Saturday 8 April at 11am, with the start of the 150 nautical mile (280 km) course. The first race of the season will help the Meath man clock up qualifying miles for the Mini Transat 2017.

Self taught Dolan will race with Breton, Francois Jambou, his sailing school colleague from Concarneau in this first race.

After a busy 2016 season, the Irish offshore sailor's plan is to focus on all the pre-season races in the Atlantic to be ready by October 1st from La Rochelle for the Transat.

Dolan's 2017 season consists of:

• April- 2 races, one duo, one solo
• May: one race, a 500 miles solo
• June: 2 races, one solo, one duo (mini Fastnet)
• July/ august: Solo transgascogne
• October: Mini Transat

Solo Sailor Tom Dolan from County Meath has booked his place in October's Mini–Transat Race from La Rochelle to Martinique.

The sole Irish entry was in Dublin last night to talk about his exploits at Poolbeg Yacht and Boat Club. This will be Dolan's second Mini–adventure having successfully competed in 2015.

For this 2017 edition of the race, organised by Collectif Rochelais pour la Mini Transat, the race will host a full contingent as the number of applicants signed up for the adventure already exceeds the 84 places available. Download the full entry list below.

- The Mini Transat 2017 will set sail from La Rochelle
- Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Le Marin (Martinique) the stopover and finish venues
- 84 competitors expected on the start line on 1 October 2017

Forty years on from its first edition, the Mini Transat remains on the crest of the wave. A maiden voyage for some, a stepping stone to further sporting challenges for others, the Mini Transat holds a very special place in the world of offshore racing. In an era of new technologies and intensive communication, it is still the only event where each racer is pitted solely against themselves during a transatlantic crossing. No contact with land, no other link to the outside world than a single VHF radio, at times the Mini Transat is a voyage into solitude.

Boats: minimum length, maximum speed

With an overall length of 6.50m and a sail area pushed to the extreme at times, the Minis are incredibly seaworthy boats. Subjected to rather draconian righting tests and equipped with reserve buoyancy making them unsinkable, the boats are capable of posting amazing performances in downwind conditions… most often to the detriment of comfort, which is rudimentary to say the least. In the Class Mini, racers can choose between prototypes and production boats from yards. The prototypes are genuine laboratories, which frequently foreshadow the major architectural trends, whilst the production boats tend to be more somewhat tempered by design.

Racers: from the amateur to the future greats of offshore racing

There are countless sailors of renown who have made their debut in the Mini Transat. From Jean-Luc Van Den Heede to Loïck Peyron and Thomas Coville, Isabelle Autissier and Sam Davies, a number of offshore racing stars have done the rounds on a Mini. However, the Mini Transat is also a lifelong dream for a number of amateur racers who, in a bid to compete in this extraordinary adventure, sacrifice work and family to devote themselves to their consuming passion. Nobody comes back from the Mini Transat completely unchanged. This year, there will be 84 solo sailors, 10 of whom are women! The Mini Transat is also the most international of offshore races with no fewer than 15 nationalities scheduled to take the start.

The course: from La Rochelle to the West Indies via the South face

Two legs are offered to make Martinique from Europe’s Atlantic coasts. The leg from La Rochelle to Las Palmas de Gran Canaria is a perfect introduction to proceedings before taking the big transatlantic leap. The Bay of Biscay can be tricky to negotiate in autumn while the dreaded rounding of Cape Finisterre on the north-west tip of Spain marks a kind of prequel to the descent along the coast of Portugal. Statistically, this section involves downwind conditions, often coloured by strong winds and heavy seas. Making landfall in the Canaries requires finesse and highly developed strategic know-how.

The second leg will set sail on 1 November. Most often carried along by the trade wind, the solo sailors set off on what tends to be a little over two weeks at sea on average. At this point, there’s no way out: en route to the West Indies, there are no ports of call. The sailors have to rely entirely upon themselves to make Martinique, where they’ll enjoy a well-deserved Ti Punch cocktail to celebrate their accomplishments since embarking on the Mini adventure.