Yachts & Yachting – April 2018

AlexThomson,BritishstarofthelastVendéeGloberace,and veteran

ofthree,mustsurelynowbeonforawin,asTOBY HEPPELL discovers

ALEX THOMSON INTERVIEW

A

lex Thomson should

not be gearing up for

the 2020 Vendée Globe

race; he’d made the

decision to stop after

his third edition of the famous solo

round the world epic, which concluded

in early 2017. But, closing in on the

finish, with second position in the

bag (equalling the best result by any

non-French sailor) and victory all but

assured for his rival Armel Le Cléac’h,

Thomson picked up the phone to his

wife and said: “They are going to ask

me at the finish if I want to go again...”

The specifics of that conversation

remain with Thomson and his family,

but this is a man who knows he has it

in him to win the ultimate prize and

become the first non-French winner

of what is correctly regarded as one

of the toughest sporting challenges in

the world. Vocalised or otherwise, it

seems implicit that he will not happily

relinquish that dream until it is achieved.

PUTTING IN THE HARD YARDS

Itcanbehardforthecasualobserver

tograspentirelyjusthowsignificanta

commitment the decision to race in the

Vendéeis.Everyedition,anumberof

sailorsstruggleforfouryearstothenfall

short of managing to cross the startline.

Withahand-selectedteamaround

him and one of the most successful

sponsorshippartnershipsintheworld

TIME TO

GO AGAIN

of sport with Hugo Boss, Thomson is

highly unlikely to miss out on the start,

but that is not to say it is feet up until

setting off in 2020. In fact there has been

little time for anything since the finish

of the last Vendée, just over a year ago.

“We have sailed, I think, about 15,

miles in the last year since the finish of

the event,” Thomson explains. “We’ve

been to Copenhagen, Sopot, Kiel, Sylt,

then we did the Fastnet, then it was

Dublin, then Cork and then Cannes

Below

Alex on board

Hugo Boss at the

last Vendée finish

more data on the current boat and the

chance to test some developments.

It seems the work for another Vendée

begins the moment the previous one

finishes. “You need to look at it in the

same terms as an Olympic campaign.

It is the same four-year period between

events and you are working non-stop

towards that single goal. Some of what

you are doing is different, of course,

but it is the same non-stop cycle.”

With so many miles under her belt,

Hugo Boss has gone into the yard at

Endeavour Quay in the team’s home-port

of Gosport where she has undergone

a relatively substantial refit. Some of

this work has been merely cosmetic,

some routine maintenance, but some

has been to develop the boat and take

advantage of specific ideas the team has

come up with since she set off in pursuit

of Vendée victory, though as Thomson

points out when I wonder which area

these improvements are being made: “We

won’t be speaking to anyone about that.”

NEW BOAT FOR 2020

With the newly added foils, which

provide lift, being kept for a second

generation of IMOCA 60s there is,

presumably, a significant amount of

performance still to come from even

this generation of boats. Not only that

butThomsonunquestionablyhadthe

most radical and quickest boat in the

lastVendée.Sowhy,then,withsomuch

and Malta and some others.” A decent

portion of this is corporate sailing

for supporters and sponsors which

would take place irrespective of the

decision to go again in the Vendée,

but with a new campaign looming

many of these miles also offer yet

LLOYD IMAGES/ALEX THOMSON RACING

18 Yachts & Yachting April 2018 yachtsandyachting.co.uk