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Theirs appears an unlikely paring, given the French ultra runner was a non sailor before some initial training with Colman, but the Kiwi was keen to re-visit fundamental elements of solo and short handed ocean racing through the eyes of an endurance athlete. The duo had some very tough times in the Channel and on the Bay of Biscay when Blanchard was very sea sick unable to keep food down for several days. But their passage improved and in the trade winds they made good speeds and Blanchard learned how to trim and setter the boat.
“In the latter stages I’d be going to ask Matthieu to do something and he’d already have done it. It was a very cool experience.”
Because of initial autopilot problems they had to pull into Roscoff for some brief, but essential repairs. According to Colman these hours cost them the chance to stay in phase with their nearest rivals.
Conrad, full of energy and enthusiasm at the dock said, “Seeing it all through the eyes of Matthieu was cool, I have lost count how many Transats I have done having done my first in 2007 and at first there were lots of questions, the boat, how do we work? How do we live? And after the Vendée Globe with this boat, this seemed a good way to relive, to relearn the sensations, to share the learning and the new experiences with Matthieu. So I am very happy.”
“The first night in fact was one of he hardest I have been through on a boat in my life, in the Channel, harder than my Transats and my round the worlds. The problem was as soon as we got out of Le Havre I set up the pilot and it did not work, in the village we had configured it but it just did not work. Which was hard as I was effectively alone, Matthieu was not yet trained and we were facing 50 knots in the Channel. But I set up the second pilot and it did not work either – for a different reason – so it was very disappointing. And so I did not want to put the project in danger or ourselves in danger so we did a little timeout, few hours in Roscoff with he team, it was very efficient, they had all the pieces and so it was quick. But that few hours lost us the course, we were out of phase with the others and the weather, everyone got ahead of the second storm they were around Cape Finisterre and so we were hammered and hammered and just could not play the race we wanted. So it was a bit disappointing. But from a human adventure point of view it was all good from there really.”
Mathieu will take time to recover as he plans to take on the Trans-Martinique ultra race in just over two weeks time. He said, “It was better after the Canaries and really it has been a good week since but off the coast of Portugal it was not easy. But after three weeks at sea I can see there are many similarities between our worlds, the cross overs, ours is a sport too which requires mental strength, managing sleep and nutrition and so it was fascinating to experience this other world.”
