Veteran Joyon wins close transatlantic Route du Rhum race

Francis Joyon won the closest Route du Rhum since it was first staged in 1978

Pointe-à-Pitre (AFP) - Veteran French yachtsman Francis Joyon won the closest Route du Rhum transatlantic race since 1978 on Sunday after a nail-biting final lap around Guadeloupe’s main island.

Joyon, 62, sailed into Pointe-a-Pitre just before midnight to take victory in the single-handed race after seven days, 14 hours, 21 minutes and 47 seconds at sea, setting a new record.

Long-time race leader Francois Gabart, 35, arrived just seven minutes and eight seconds behind Joyon in the 11th edition of the daunting race dubbed “Formula One on water” due to the next-generation, high-speed boats taking part.

It was the smallest winning margin since Canadian Mike Birch won the first ever Route du Rhum in his boat Olympus in 1978 just 1min 38sec ahead of Michel Malinovsky.

Joyon’s victory was his first in seven attempts.

“It was really an extraordinary race,” he said, praising Gabart, whose boat was badly damaged by storms during the race, as “highly brave and committed”.

Gabart said: “We were neck and neck, it was great. I’ll never forget that I was scared, it was tense at times as I watched Francis catch up. We crossed the line almost side by side in the dark.”

Joyon bettered the previous record set in 2014 by another French sailor, Loick Peyron, who sailed the same boat as Joyon to victory in seven days, 15 hours, eight minutes and 32 seconds.

All 123 challengers, half of them in small Class 40 boats, set off from Saint Malo in northwest France on November 4 for Guadeloupe, a French-governed archipelago in the Caribbean.

French skipper Francis Joyon sailed into Point-a-Pitre just before midnight to take victory in the single-handed Route du Rhum transatlantic race in record time

Both Joyon’s Idec Sport and Gabart’s Macif were vessels called Ultim – maxi-trimarans which can speed across the waves at 85km/h (45 knots).

The other Ultim skippers included Armel Le Cleac’h, winner of the most recent solo round-the-world Vendee Globe, but his dreams of victory were scuppered when his vessel, Banque Populaire IX, capsized and he had to be rescued by a fishing boat.

He was one of four challengers in the fastest Ultim category to drop out after Sebastien Josse, Thomas Coville and Romain Pilliard also hit difficulties, taking refuge in the Spanish port of La Coruna.