Team Malizia is ready to race: today, Boris Herrmann’s sailing team kicks off their busy race calendar for the upcoming years by participating in the Défi Azimut 2022, their first race with their new Malizia - Seaexplorer race yacht. This year, the international team has grown its sailing crew, launched their new race machine on 19 July and christened their boat in Boris Herrmann’s hometown Hamburg only a week ago, during the Malizia Ocean Festival to which over 12,000 visitors attended.
The race yacht, carrying the striking United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on its sails, was delivered back by the team from the Hanseatic city to Brittany just in time to take part in its first IMOCA race this week.
The Défi Azimut - Lorient Agglomération is an event taking place off the coast of Lorient, Brittany, over the course of six days (13 to 18 September).
The event includes speed runs and races, and is part of the IMOCA GLOBE SERIES 2021-25 Championship. An impressively large fleet will compete in this 12th edition: 30 IMOCAs will be on the starting line. This comes as no surprise as the Défi Azimut is the last match between boats of the IMOCA class before the Route du Rhum 2022 and The Ocean Race 2023. All the IMOCA race yachts competing in the round-the-world race next year are also participating in this week’s event.
Malizia - Seaexplorer will take part in Wednesday’s speed runs, hosting guests to experience sailing on the new boat for the first time. During the 48-hour Azimut on Thursday, Team Malizia will sail a looped circuit in the Atlantic in The Ocean Race crew mode, with Boris Herrmann (41, German) as Skipper, Will Harris (28, English), Rosalin Kuiper (27, Dutch) and Nico Lunven (39, French) as Co-Skippers and Antoine Auriol (37, French-German) as Onboard Reporter. The race tracker will be available on the team’s and the competition’s websites for anyone to follow live. The images Antoine Auriol will capture will also be shared for everyone to feel as if they were sailing onboard Malizia - Seaexplorer. The week will conclude a tour of the Île de Groix on Sunday.
The Défi Azimut is the last crewed competition before The Ocean Race, starting on 15 January 2023 in Alicante, Spain. Until then, the team will practice in crew configuration during training sessions, such as those at Port La Forêt, and during deliveries, like the return from Guadeloupe after the Route du Rhum at the end of November.
Team Malizia is joined in its effort to be one of the most exciting sailing teams and a champion for sustainability and climate action by seven main partners: EFG International, Zurich Group Germany, Kuehne+Nagel, MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company, Hapag-Lloyd, Schütz and The Yacht Club de Monaco.
