A few days off from the launch of the 8th edition of the Vendée Globe, the sailing world finds itself mourning the disappearance of Chinese sailor Guo Chan. The 51-year-old sailing star from China set off, on 19 October, from San Francisco in an attempt to set a new world record for a singlehanded crossing of the Pacific Ocean. His maxi-trimaran, Qingdao China, was found empty and adrift 8 days later by rescuers sent out from a US Navy vessel. The trimaran Qingdao China, better known as IDEC, was the former boat of Francis Joyon.
It was in 2015 that Guo Chuan purchased the Irens design launched by Francis in 2007, on board of which the French sailor from Locmariaquer wrote some of the finest pages in the history of oceanic sailing. Joyon, as well as the entire crew of IDEC SPORT, was greatly affected by the news: “The drama that occurred on our former boat touches us in more ways than one,” declared Francis. “Guo was a man for whom I had the greatest admiration. As a former scientist, he was not one of the ‘old boys’ but instead he came to sailing late and made it on his own. I followed his attempts passionately, and had full respect for what he was capable of achieving.”
A feeling shared by the crew of Idec Sport, in stand-by mode for a new attempt at the Jules Verne Trophy, and especially Boris Herrmann from Germany, one of Guo’s crewmembers during his recent attempt to pass through the Northwest passage.
In 2013, Guo Chuan became the first Chinese person to circumnavigate the world without stops (137 days 20 hours), on a monohull.
Source : www.idecsport-sailing.com