Retour à La Base : Martinique start is now on Sunday November 30
Because of the delay to the start of the Transat Jacques Vabre Normandie Le Havre for the IMOCAs an and to allow the sailors time to recover and their technical teams time to repair their boats the start time for the Retour à La Base, the solo IMOCA race back from Martinique to Lorient has been set for Thursday, November 30.
The 38 skippers entered on this new solo race on the IMOCA calendar, the Retour À La Base, will leave Fort-de-France in Martinique on Thursday November 30, heading for Lorient in Morbihan. This represents a four-day delay compared to the original date of November 26 because of the later start to the Transat Jacques Vabre - Normandie Le Havre for the IMOCAs, which in the end started on Tuesday, November 7 at 9:30 a.m.
Hubert Lemonnier, Retour À La Base Race Director said,
“We had to adapt to the decision of the Race Direction of the Transat Jacques Vabre as they waited for the right weather window to start the fleet of 40 IMOCAs across the Bay of Biscay in complete safety. Meantime we have in place all the confirmations from the organizers of the "stage" in Martinique that we would have all the port structures necessary to accommodate boats. We needed also to ensure a minimum rest and preparation time between two races for all teams.”