Big fleet transport

How do you arrange return transport for a transatlantic racing fleet from a port with nowhere for a ship to come alongside? You get Sevenstar involved

There are many transatlantic races but the Transquadra is unique. An apex offshore challenge for amateur solo and doublehanded sailors over 40 years of age, this passage race from France to Martinique via Madeira is just as fiercely competitive as the grand prix ocean events for professional teams, with a big fleet and a high calibre of sailors. Arranging efficient transport to bring most of the boats back to Europe after the race is a complex logistical challenge, so it’s no surprise that Sevenstar is a longstanding official partner of the Transquadra and plays a crucial supporting role in its enduring success.

This year’s Transquadra fleet of 39 monohulls between 8.5m and 12m LOA arrived at Le Marin, Martinique in mid to late February after a fast and frequently boisterous passage from Funchal, Madeira. One month later, a full deck of 25 of the Transquadra boats were already on their way back to Lorient, Brittany as mast-up cargo on a Sevenstar ship, a massive logistical operation, along with 27 other yachts from the Caribbean. A separate transport was arranged on another ship for the smaller number of competitors who started the Transquadra in Marseille, rather than La Turballe, returning them to Genoa - a giant puzzle. Which yacht to be placed where in and on the vessel. A lot of calculations go into it beforehand.

The man who schedules and coordinates this operation is Matthieu Le Bihan, Sevenstar’s lead agent in France. A yacht transport expert with more than two decades of experience and an offshore racing sailor in his own right, Le Bihan has been organising return transport for the Transquadra, Route du Rhum, Mini Transat and most other French transatlantic races for many years. He has also arranged salvage operations for clients such as Alex Thompson and yacht transport for a wide variety of private owners.

‘The main business we have in France is taking new build yachts from the factories of the main French brands like Beneteau and exporting them worldwide,’ he says. ‘But the French ocean races are part of my work because I know the market well and have developed very good knowledge of large fleet logistics and return shipments over the years.’

The French model of yacht racing logistics is a bit different, Le Bihan explains. Instead of individual skippers or teams each arranging their own return transport or delivery passage after an ocean race, a shipping service is arranged for the fleet en masse. The Transquadra has this in common with professional French ocean races but the scope of the service provided is different.

‘We learn from each edition of the race and refine our service for the next one,’ he says. ‘The racers are really confident in our setup.’

The stow plan for the transport is designed long before the yachts even arrive at Le Marin. A key element of the operation, this is a carefully engineered process of planning precisely where and how each yacht is going to be placed and secured on deck. ‘That’s a really important job performed by our head office in Amsterdam,’ Le Bihan explains. ‘They work with specialist software like AutoCAD and Rhino. They get the design specifications of the yachts from the shipyards that built them. Then they design the stow plan according to the spec of the ship. For bigger yachts we make a 3D simulation so we can accurately visualise the loading. It’s high precision work.’

‘That’s on paper. On the day of operation we have our own highly skilled loadmasters on site, normally two of them, who make sure that all the yachts are in the correct position on deck. We nearly always need to adjust things, sometimes on a daily basis, so we need great flexibility within our team and the plan needs to be flexible.’

One thing that’s highly unusual about this operation is that Le Marin does not have a commercial port where Sevenstar’s ship can come alongside to load the yachts. Instead, the loading operation has to be done while the ship is anchored out in the bay.

‘We have one rigging setup that fits most of the yachts,’ Le Bihan says. ‘The big challenge is to deliver a constant stream of yachts for loading, with one arriving alongside the ship every 25 minutes to be lifted onto the weather deck. We have several professional crews who deliver the yachts from the marina. This year we’ve got a pontoon anchored near the ship where we can hold a buffer of two or three yachts to keep the operation running constantly.’

While private owners or their skippers are responsible for delivering their yacht alongside Sevenstar’s ship for transport, with a racing fleet the service starts much earlier. When all the yachts have arrived, the sailors have a briefing with Sevenstar’s agents, then they attend the prizegiving for the race and fly straight home. ‘They literally drop off their boat keys at our agent’s office in Le Marin and collect them back in Lorient on arrival,’ Le Bihan says.

‘We tell the Transquadra racers to prepare their boats as if they were going to winterise them. Our vessels are quite fast – average speed on this route is 15-17kts – and with a strong contrary trade wind you can get 35kts apparent on deck. That’s the sort of wind you need to prepare for in winter when your boat is laid up ashore or afloat in its berth, and that’s basically what we ask. We give each owner a checklist and when the yacht is ready we send a technician from our agency in Le Marin to go on board and make sure everything is properly prepared.’

‘From there we take care of everything. We store the yacht in the marina of Le Marin, we arrange a survey during that period, we get a professional skipper and crew to deliver the yacht alongside our ship, we take care of the paperwork for customs clearance. It’s really a turnkey solution.’

Above and below: nearly all yachts are transported on deck with their masts up but they can also be carried in the hold with the mast down. Here Arnaud Boissières’ dismasted Imoca and a cruising cat are loaded onto the same ship as the 25 Transquadra yachts

Yachts are nearly always carried on deck, he explains. Occasionally they go in the hold with other cargo, but only when space is tight or the mast is already un-stepped. For example Arnaud Boissières’ Imoca was on the same ship as the Transquadra fleet but carried down below, after losing its mast in the Vendée Globe.

Shipping the Transquadra yachts mast-up is a major advantage for their owners, Le Bihan says, because many of them are keen to enter Spi Ouest – by far the biggest regatta on the west coast of France – which starts very soon after the ship arrives in Lorient. ‘The same goes for some of our private clients who have their yacht in the Caribbean for Antigua Sailing Week,’ he says. ‘We get the boat back home just in time for Spi Ouest.’

Sevenstar is part of the Spliethoff Group, a major shipowner, most of whose 140 ships are equipped with powerful cranes and have outside deck space optimised for carrying yachts. When they lift a yacht on or off the ship, its backstay is removed temporarily and then re-attached but the rest of the rig is left intact. Unloading takes just two days in total and many of the yachts returning from the Caribbean with the Transquadra fleet sail immediately to La Trinité for the start of Spi Ouest with no re-rigging and very little rig tuning required. Sevenstar’s motto, “We make more racing possible”, reflects the speed of the service. ‘On arrival it’s plug and play,’ Le Bihan says. ‘They can do their next race in a couple of days, after just putting the sails back on.’

Weather conditions can cause a delay, both at sea and in port – as every sailor knows – but a sensible amount of slack is built into the schedule and the loading and unloading operations can generally proceed in winds up to 25 or 30kts. ‘Beyond that it depends on the local conditions, whether it’s sheltered or not.’ Occasionally, striking dock workers can cause disruption and the fading operation is moved to a different port. ‘The most important thing is to anticipate any potential problems and maintain constant communication with all of our suppliers and stakeholders,’ Le Bihan says. In ports where large racing fleets are unloaded and unloaded, Sevenstar’s agents are made aware of all requirements for the operation months in advance.

For the Transquadra fleet and most private owners, Sevenstar’s head office ensures that a suitable cradle for each boat is provided as part of the service. For other transports like one of Le Bihan’s next projects, shipping the Figaro 3 fleet home to France at the end of the Transat Paprec, every boat has its own specific cradle that must be collected in advance, checked and shipped to the pick-up point at the end of the race. For the Figaro 3s, this is Pointe-à-Pitre in Guadeloupe.

‘The fact that I’m a racing sailor myself brings me a better understanding of the service I need to provide in my job,’ Le Bihan says. ‘I sail a Mini 6.50 based in Douarnenez and last year I raced in the Mini Fastnet. I’m passionate about sailing and also passionate about my work.’

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