BOSS: Alex Thompson x First Sailing Race

British skipper Alex Thomson began his debut race aboard the new HUGO BOSS yacht in the Transat Jacques Vabre. Thomson and his co-skipper, fellow Briton Neal McDonald, departed from Le Havre, France this afternoon to begin the double-handed 4,350-mile race, which finishes in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. 

In what is the 14th edition of the classic offshore race, a record 29 yachts within the IMOCA class will compete, each looking to finish on top in the famous ‘Route du Café’ sprint.

Co-skipper McDonald is a seven-time Volvo Ocean Race competitor and former Olympic sailor with more than 30 years of experience in professional sailing. 

Now the Performance Manager at Alex Thomson Racing, McDonald has worked closely alongside Thomson and his team since 2016.

The race marks the first time that fans of Thomson and his team will witness first-hand the new HUGO BOSS boat in competitive action following the yacht’s launch last month on the River Thames in London. The pair believes that the Transat Jacques Vabre will be a prime opportunity to work together and learn more about their groundbreaking new boat: “This is a learning and testing opportunity, first and foremost,” said Thomson as he prepared to begin the race today. “The race will give us the opportunity to understand just what this boat is capable of, and it will undoubtedly inform the next stages of our development as we head towards the Vendée Globe next year.”

The boat was built with this very goal in mind – win the 2020 Vendée Globe – a race that remains one of the toughest sporting challenges in the world today and has only ever been won by a French sailor. With just two competitive races in the team’s schedule before then, the Transat Jacques Vabre and the New York-Vendée race in June 2020, the British team plans to maximize every available opportunity to familiarize themselves with this boat in the hope that it will lead them to Vendée Globe gold.

“We of course know the Transat Jacques Vabre very well,” said Thomson. He continued, “We finished second in this race in both 2003 and 2015. However, this time around, with a new boat, the goal is to reach the finish line with the boat in good condition, and with a great deal of knowledge gained along the way. If we can do that, then I believe we place ourselves in a very good position for 2020.”