In a hugely disappointing twist of fate this morning Sam Goodchild and Ned Collier-Wakefield were forced to retire from the 10th edition of the biennial Transat Jacques Vabre. Concise 2 their Class 40 was leading the smallest class in the race after only recently taking the lead from Aquerelle.com in the night. Concise 2 was beginning to show cracks in the hull and it was feared that the she might start taking on water, which forced them to retire.
Sam Goodchild and Ned Collier Wakefield © Lloyd Images
“We have a crack along the port side which is from slamming through the waves for the last two days, so we are trying to be careful not to do any more and make sure it is not getting any worse,” said Goodchild. “At the moment there is no water ingress but we feel that is not too far away. We realised this when we were on a watch change I went to hang up my foul weather gear I saw it, I found the crack then.”
The previous two days of weather saw the youngest team competing racing in up to 64-knots of wind and heavy confused seas, which has resulted in the damage to the hull. A devastated Goodchild explained: “It is pretty devastating. This race is something we have been both looking forward to for such a long time. It has been my dream for so long, so then to take the start and to be in a position we never imagined we would be in, second for most of the first week and then overtaking last night, it kind of rubs it in a bit more and makes it a bit more devastating. But at the same time we can go home not feeling too annoyed with ourselves. We put up a good fight and made good calls, not too many mistakes and that’s it.”
On hearing the news record-setting sailor Mike Golding tweeted: “Gutted for Team Concise being forced to retire from #tjv2011. @nedcw & @goodchildsam are real stars of the future #watchthisspace.” Demonstrating how this young duo impressed the sailing fraternity with their seven days of racing in this legendary race.
This year the race has faced huge storms with nature flexing her power over all ocean races competing at the moment. Concise 2’s retirement is the fifth one from the 16-boat Class 40 fleet that started, and the 13th boat of the 35-boats that started on the 2nd November in France that will not make it to the finish line in Costa Rica. The race was postponed for 72-hours to let exceptional low pressure fronts pass before the teams took to the start line in submission to the intense weather systems.
