Retour à La Base: Boris Herrmann under pressure - repairs after a difficult night

The pace and conditions remain high and challenging on the sixth day of the Retour à La Base. Yoann Richomme, who called his new "Paprec Arkéa" an "insane machine" after finishing second in the two-handed Transat Jacques Vabre race, continues to lead the field of Imoca soloists with confidence.

The Frenchman is currently reaping the rewards for his extreme northern route of the past few days. Yoann Richomme recently documented life on board during this single-handed transit with intensive images and said dryly: "It's off on board the infernal machine." Richomme hopes to get favourable winds for the last section from the Azores to France and said: "It will still be a very long way to the finish."

Boris Herrmann: into the night with machine problems

The new Koch-Conq design "Paprec Arkéa" had a lead of almost 70 nautical miles on St Nicholas afternoon over the "Charal" skipper Jérémie Beyou, who was not letting up. Behind him, Sam Goodchild defended third place on the four-year-old "For the Planet", which once carried Thomas Ruyant to great success as "LinkedOut". Ruyant, on the other hand, is plagued by technical problems after his solo world record, said he had switched from racing to cruising mode when his mainsail tore and hoped to be able to defend his tenth place to the finish.

And now Boris Herrmann is also struggling after a difficult night. His problems began on the evening of 5 December when he was unable to start the engine. Apart from emergencies, the engine is not used to power the boat during the race. It generates electricity when there is not enough sunlight for the solar panels or the boat is travelling too fast for the hydro generators.

Water ingress on "Malizia - Seaexplorer"

After a few failed attempts - possibly caused by the cold or the rough sea - the man from Hamburg managed to get the engine going again. Soon, however, unusually loud noises could be heard. The "Malizia - Seaexplorer" skipper wondered whether it could be a problem with a cylinder or the alternator belt. He contacted the shore team and waited a few hours for the engine to cool down after receiving initial advice. Then he started with the repair attempts.

At the same time, the victim noticed that a lot of water was suddenly entering the cockpit area. The reason: the cover of the cockpit drain on the starboard side had been torn off, allowing the seawater to enter. The cockpit drain has the same diameter as a normal drain pipe. It is fitted with a cover that prevents the water from flowing back into the boat, but allows it to drain away cleanly.

On the night shift: drawing water until you're exhausted

The same problem had already occurred on the port side in the first few days of the race. However, because the water was able to drain away on the starboard side, the first mishap has not been a drama so far. So far. It would be possible to seal both drains completely with on-board material such as Sikaflex to be on the safe side, but this would also prevent water from constantly entering the boat through hatches or entrances and exits.

Boris Herrmann had to scoop the water out of the cockpit by hand throughout the night and today. He decided not to use the bilge pump in view of his already existing power generation problems. He preferred to save the electricity. As a temporary solution, Herrmann has now put a Sikaflex ring around the drain plug and continues to scoop the water out of the cockpit.

Reduced speed, the hydrogenerator in risky use

As the engine problems are still ongoing, Boris Herrmann slowed his boat down and risked using the port hydro generator. On Wednesday afternoon, "Malizia - Seaexplorer" was still travelling very fast at 20 knots at times in order to generate some power for the boat's energy-hungry electronics. With swell and even more speed, however, the water generator might not be able to withstand the strain.

Team Malizia announced on Wednesday afternoon that the skipper wanted to recover from the strain for a few hours and keep the boat dry on the inside. The good news, as some water is still getting into the boat: the technical team has found a better solution for the drains. However, according to the team, implementation is currently very difficult in the "bumpy conditions".

Hope for better times

Therefore, the team boss must now rest before he can start the repair attempt. The exhausted Boris Herrmann will try to maintain his fifth place on the sixth day of the Retour à La Base. He hoped on Wednesday afternoon that St Nicholas' Day at sea would be a little kinder to him again as soon as possible.

"We're here to sail and then..." - On Wednesday evening, Boris Herrmann sent a current video about his technical challenges:

Here, front-runner Yoann Richomme reports directly from the cockpit of his "Paprec Arkéa":

This clip was made shortly before Boris Herrmann had to deal with a whole series of challenging technical problems:

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