“The planets aligned today and everything went perfectly! The weather window was somewhat unexpected, but it allowed us to carry out the launch of the platform and then step the mast straight afterwards,” said delighted skipper Charles Caudrelier at the end of the day. The technical team will now move on to testing and fine-tuning what is undoubtedly the fastest offshore yacht in the world today.
Innovative Systems… and a Long Development Phase Ahead
Gitana 18 is now moored at the dock of her home port, but it will still be a few days before the Maxi Edmond de Rothschild casts off her lines and sails her first miles off Lorient. The trimaran’s architecture and the scale of her highly innovative appendages require the technical team to install a number of components once the Maxi is afloat. For this reason, only the float rudders were visible at launch. Even so, these U-shaped appendages immediately drew attention and raised questions. They will later be joined by the lifting central rudder and the daggerboard. This major appendage, positioned in the middle of the central hull and fitted with a 3-meter-span metal “manta-ray” wing, will be able to pivot but will remain fixed in height. As for the Y-shaped canting foils, fitted with wings spanning more than 5 meters, they will be installed later, once the period of static testing has been completed. The story is only just beginning. A long and meticulous development process now awaits Charles Caudrelier and the members of the Gitana Team: the delicate fine-tuning of a prototype as sophisticated as it is demanding. The ramp-up will take place over the next eight months, with one clear objective: to be on the starting line in Saint-Malo on November 1 to defend the team’s title in the Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe.
Charles Caudrelier, Skipper of the Maxi Edmond de Rothschild:
“It is an immense pleasure to see the Maxi Edmond de Rothschild afloat - it brings three years of work to fruition. Today we are entering a new phase in the life of this boat and we are finally going to discover what she has in store for us on the water. Personally, these 26 months of construction have been a rich and fascinating period that I feel very fortunate and grateful to have experienced. Building a Maxi like Gitana 18 was already a major technological and human challenge, and now an equally important challenge awaits us in her development. We are not starting from scratch thanks to all the experience gained with Gitana 17, but with Gitana 18 we are moving into another dimension. Everything in the systems that have been designed is new. The development phase will be intense, as the timeframe is short before our main objective of the season - the Route du Rhum. I hope we can quickly make her as high-performing as she is beautiful!”
