For several days, the concern has been going up on the pontoons of Saint-Malo among the sailors engaged due to the announcement of bad weather conditions for the race.
Le Monde
The 12
[(new departure date 🏁)]
𝗖’𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗼𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗹: The new date of departure from the Route du Rhum – Destination Guadelo… https://t.co/kq02tzfteh
The 138 committed skippers should initially start on Sunday, but the announcement of very bad weather conditions off Brittany from Monday had resulted in the postponement of the race, for the first time in its history.
Village closure Sunday evening 2>
On the side of skippers, the decision was well received. “I think it is a good decision that was not easy to make. It is wise and reasonable given the particularly violent conditions that were coming”, reacted François Gabart (SVR-Lazartigue) who left for edge of an Ultim, Maxitrimaran 32 meters long. “The fastest boats might have been able to avoid the gust of wind, heading for Ireland, but not all. And there would not have been room for 138 boats to shelter in The surrounding ports “, he estimated.
The Route du Rhum fleet is made up of six categories of sailboats: small single -wing monohulls participated in the first edition with the latest generation flying multihulls. Some are more fragile than others and less suitable for navigation during storms. “The weather conditions are exceptional, so it’s a wise decision,” reacted Armel Le Cléac’h (-popular banking). “It’s good. We knew we went to war, but these are our Olympic Games to us, so we would have been there anyway (…) and it could be dangerous,” said Charles Caudrelier (Edmond-de -Rothschild).
“I am relieved as a runner. You could lose boats and human lives. The problem is that there was not really escape to avoid bad weather,” reacted to His tour, with the France-Presse agency, Erwan Le Roux (Koesio), skipper and president of the Ocean Fifty class, light trimarans 15 meters in length.
As planned, this Sunday will be the last day of opening of the animation village, open to all until 5 p.m., the organizers said in a press release. It will allow visitors to come and see the boats still present in the pools before their Atlantic sprint.