Life aboard the IMOCA D'Ieteren Group

At night, everything is dependent on the conditions and the area I’m navigating.

Close to the coast, keeping watch is very important, especially towards the Bay of Biscay or around Martinique fairly recently, as there is heavy shipping, which translates as short snatches of fragmented sleep. In contrast, you can sleep for a little longer offshore, whilst remaining vigilant, checking for shipping, trimming to optimise your progress and then going back to sleep.

During the day, you can have short naps and I have no problem falling asleep. In fact, I went to see a breathing coach to assess my breathing patterns. She gave me a few breathing exercises to wake me up and fall into a deep sleep more quickly.

I went back to see her several times before the Vendée Globe. It’s interesting and, ultimately, it’s easy and something that is accessible to all: even if it’s only about learning to breathe through your nose, breathing deeply and varying the inhale and exhale times… a bit like free diving.

For sleeping, if I have to remain vigilant, I use the beanbag so I can see the computer easily, otherwise I have a proper bunk. I have two methods for sleeping in the bunk, one with boots on, one without. When I keep my boots on, I wake up easily after 20 minutes, whereas when I remove them, I fall into a longer, deeper sleep. For a long race like the Vendée Globe, I have a memory foam mattress as sleep is an important factor.

I really enjoy the weather and routing aspect so I think I easily spend two to three hours on it aboard each day.

I download the weather files that I then integrate into a routing file in which I indicate my starting point and my finishing point. Next, this piece of software calculates the optimum course for me to make as fast headway as possible according to a target speed (in line with the wind strength and direction). This is a theoretical model, which has to be compared to the reality on the water and it’s not always accurate.

When I receive the weather file, it’s already 6 to 8 hours late by the time I’ve processed the information in the calculation software. A weather file received at 7 a.m. comes from the previous day’s data at (around) 11 p.m.

There are different types of calculation software (American, European and French models), which sometimes come up with different versions and that’s where the skipper’s interpretation gets interesting.

We make our choices and add in lots of factors to determine the routing: the wind angle, the wind strength, etc. Not all the information is on these files so we need to consult other websites to complete the data with aspects like cloud cover, sea state and current… all of that comes into the equation.

The two main phases are often in the morning (new weather file) and the evening (calculation made that day). Updates are at different times according to the models and don’t operate in the same navigation zones. You could spend the whole day on it!

We’re lucky enough to be equipped with Starlink (*high speed antenna installed on the boat that provides access to high-speed internet, which is much less expensive than the traditional satellite antennas, editor’s note). This really opens up possibilities in terms of information, cross-referencing of sources and communication. We were very pleased with it in the last two transatlantic races. This network is beginning to cover the entire globe. There are still some questions about the South Atlantic but we’re awaiting feedback from the Ultims when they competed in the Arkéa Ultim Challenge, as they were also using this software.

This also simplifies our communication: we can have video calls with children and chat with the team too.

We have a WhatsApp technical group where I can ask questions and share my concerns with them. They then sort through them, discuss them and come up with solutions among themselves before responding to me.

For the Vendée Globe, a guarding system is in place with rotations within the team to prioritise the most important elements and the communication.

We also agree on a specific vocabulary and common terms to ensure we understand one another properly and optimise our communication. Up till now, despite all the technical issues encountered during previous races, we’ve always managed to communicate and resolve any worries together.