Italian-American skipper Francesca Clapcich brought her IMOCA 11th Hour Racing across the finish line of the 13th edition of the Route du Rhum Destination Guadeloupe at 18:41:09 hrs local time (23:41:09hrs UTC) to take eighth place from a 22 boat fleet which started the 3542 nautical miles solo Atlantic sprint from Saint Malo on Sunday 1st November.
Her pleasure at finishing the gruelling solo race is a mix of both relief and satisfaction in completing her biggest solo ocean racing challenge yet, but there was some obvious disappointment too as after an excellent first half of her race, she snapped the bowsprit off the stem of her boat which severely compromised the rest of her course, unable to use any of her big, powerful sails which fly off the sprit.
Double Olympian Clapcich, 38, who lives in the mountains of Utah, is two years into a pathway aiming at the 2028 Vendée Globe. Her result today, although a little short of what she was hoping for, will see her crowned the IMOCA Globe Series champion, the first time a female skipper has won this title which aggregates points across five major events.
After making an excellent, clean exit from Saint Malo on the north Brittany coast and the Channel, fighting in the main peloton of leaders, she erred slightly more south of west, and when the leading group became ensnared in lighter winds, trying to breach a trough to get into beneficial northerlies behind it, ‘Frankie’ was able to gain places on her faster course along with Germany’s Boris Herrmann (Malizia 4).
They were up to second and third which they held together until a nasty low pressure system brought big, unexpected gusts. But it was on Day 5 that during an horrendous battle with her J0 big headsail which had unravelled itself, that her bowsprit snapped off. She reported at the time that the J0 had gone in the water and then after she had recovered it and was setting a fractional reaching sail that the bowsprit broke away. She was holding third at the time and since then fell back, losing places. Even through the last hours of the race she was left playing spectator from afar as three rivals just in front enjoyed a spirited battle all the way to the finish guns.
Clapcich finished at 23:41:09hrs UTC (19:41:09 local time) setting an elapsed time for the race of 11d 11hrs 38m 9s. Her delta to runaway race winner Corentin Horeau (MACSF) is 1d 18h 27m and she was 1 hour 21 mins 3 secs behind seventh placed Davy Beaudart (Bureau Vallée).
Clapcich received a warm, emotional, appreciative welcome as she docked 11th Hour Racing at Point-a-Pitre’s Memorial Acte. She was pleased to have shown so well in the early part of the race
She said, “I think between the boat and myself I think we showed that we can fight for the podium. I was there and in the fight. And even without the boat being at 100 per cent with just a couple of jibs we worked hard. I think the last three days have been the hardest of my sailing career. But even then I could find joy in what I was doing and just enjoying being out there.”
And speaking about winning the IMOCA Globe Series she said, “It is cool that it is the first time that a woman has won the IMOCA Globe Series and that is just showcasing where women’s sport is nowadays. Elodie Bonafous sailed an incredible race and she was on the podium and that is amazing and now us winning the Globe Series just shows how much investment there is in women’s sport nowadays and what we are all getting out of it.”
Athough she was clearly not happy with her result, she said she had managed to take pleasure in the simplicity of racing her boat solo, “ It was great being out there, sending it with the boat making so many miles, sunsets and sunrises, no other people around, life is so simple out there, and sometimes we should all remember when things feel really complicated things can actually be very simple.”