“We Really Don’t Know”: Six Different IMOCAs and the Fastest Experiment on the Atlantic

Is the Atlantic about to expose the new IMOCA hierarchy? New York to Lorient gives two new boats their first serious offshore benchmark against proven machinery. Skipper-Press Briefing from New York Two new boats, one record-holder and the fleet’s only non-foiler leave the skippers guessing before The Ocean Race Atlantic There are six IMOCAs leaving New York and almost no sensible way to rank them, yet. Boris Herrmann has a boat launched in July that has never raced. Kojiro Shiraishi has another new-generation design with even fewer competitive miles. Francesca Clapcich has the boat that still holds the 24-hour monohull distance record. Paul Meilhat has a proven IMOCA that won The Ocean Race Europe last year. Oliver Heer has inherited an established foiler but is about to race it for the first time. Conrad Colman has the fleet’s only daggerboard boat and the least experienced crew. Then there is the North Atlantic. Six IMOCAs will race approximately 3,000 nautical miles from New York to Lorient, each carrying two women, two men and an onboard reporter. Two boats are making their racing debuts. The others offer varying combinations of proven speed, accumulated knowledge and considerably smaller budgets. “We really don’t know,” Herrmann said before departure. That is not false modesty. Different designs, limited testing and an Atlantic forecast that could force crews to back off make this a difficult race to call. The fleet at a glance Sailing crews below; each boat also carries an onboard reporter. Team Sailing crew Boat 11th Hour Racing · USA Francesca Clapcich (ITA/USA), Will Harris (GBR), Alberto Bona (ITA), Elodie-Jane Mettraux (SUI) 2022 foiler; formerly Malizia – Seaexplorer Team Malizia · Germany Boris Herrmann (GER), Cole Brauer (USA), Justine Mettraux (SUI), Julien Villion (FRA) Malizia 4; launched July 2026 United by the Ocean · France Paul Meilhat (FRA), Mariana Lobato (POR), Benjamin Ferré (FRA), Sara Stone (USA) 2022 foiler; previously raced as Biotherm DMG MORI · Japan Kojiro Shiraishi (JPN), Sam Davies (GBR), Nicolas Lunven (FRA), Arisa Moriya (JPN) New DMG MORI Global One; launched June 2026 MSIG Europe · New Zealand Conrad Colman (NZL/USA), Megan Thomson (NZL), Anna Merchant (NZL), Elie Pirnay (BEL) 2007 daggerboard IMOCA; the only non-foiler Embrace The Challenge · Switzerland Oliver Heer (SUI), Marie Riou (FRA), Liz Wardley (PNG/AUS), Lincoln Dews (AUS) 2018 foiler; formerly Charal, then Teamwork – Team SNEF The late change is aboard MSIG Europe: Elie Pirnay replaces Aaron Hume-Merry, who dislocated his shoulder during the delivery. That means the originally all-Kiwi sailing crew now includes a Belgian. Francesca Clapcich · 11th Hour Racing: “One gear. Full forward, full speed.” Clapcich’s ambition is backed by a boat that has already delivered. The Italian-American skipper is a two-time Olympian and an Ocean Race winner from 2023. Her current IMOCA is not the boat she won that race aboard: it is Herrmann’s former Malizia – Seaexplorer, which set the outright 24-hour monohull distance record of 641.13 nautical miles in May 2023. Will Harris was aboard for that run. Now he brings his knowledge of the boat to Clapcich’s campaign and races against his former skipper. “I have never raced against Will ever in my life,” Herrmann said. Harris offered the sharpest assessment of the new Malizia and DMG MORI boats: “They’re almost like in their teenage years. They’re powerful. They’re strong, but they’re not experienced yet.” Clapcich has the opposite proposition: a mature boat, a crew who understand its strengths and no intention of easing into the race. Boris Herrmann · Team Malizia: “We really don’t know.” Herrmann’s experience is extensive. His experience of Malizia 4 is not. The German skipper has completed two Vendée Globes, but his new IMOCA was launched only on July 6. He missed the delivery to New York, during which technical issues forced the crew to slow down. His own sailing time aboard amounts to “a few summer days” off Lorient. Malizia 4 is one of three sister boats developed by Team Malizia, TR Racing and Team Banque Populaire with Antoine Koch, Finot-Conq and Gsea Design. Its design aims to retain strong downwind performance while improving across a wider range of conditions. “We really don’t know. It will be a great question mark,” Herrmann said. His crew brings its own connections across the fleet. Justine Mettraux will race against her sister Elodie-Jane on 11th Hour Racing — and against the boat she previously campaigned, now in Oliver Heer’s hands. Paul Meilhat · United by the Ocean: “DMG MORI can win, Malizia can win, we can win.” Meilhat is not starting again with an unfamiliar boat. He is racing the same 2022 Verdier-designed IMOCA he took to fourth in The Ocean Race 2022–23, fifth in the Vendée Globe and victory in The Ocean Race Europe 2025. Previously under Biotherm, it now races as United by the Ocean: the campaign launched by Meilhat and Portuguese co-skipper Mariana Lobato, not the name of a replacement title sponsor. Their stated ambition is to maintain a 50–50 gender balance through the 2027 round-the-world race. “The boat is the same, but the crew is different,” Meilhat said. He sees opportunities across the fleet, including for its oldest boat. “Even Conrad Colman’s boat in light wind is really fast,” he said. “You don’t know what’s going to happen. DMG MORI can win, Malizia can win, we can win.” The difficulty is separating boat performance from weather, technical problems and how hard each crew chooses to push. “There’s also a game of bluff. They’re not going to tell us everything.” Kojiro Shiraishi · DMG MORI: “To test her and to test ourselves.” DMG MORI Global One is the fleet’s biggest design departure. Shiraishi’s new Guillaume Verdier-designed IMOCA has a pronounced central bustle beneath the hull. The aim is to sail more upright, reduce wetted surface and produce a steadier ride through waves. The competitive question is whether that translates into speed the crew can sustain, rather than brief bursts followed by heavy landings. “This race is a very big challenge for us - to test her and to test ourselves,” Shiraishi said. The three-time Vendée Globe veteran has recruited Sam Davies and Nicolas Lunven alongside Arisa Moriya. Their experience is particularly valuable aboard a boat whose systems and handling are still being learned. “It’s very interesting. I learn a lot every day with them,” Shiraishi said. For Moriya, the race also opens a pathway into fully crewed IMOCA competition that has rarely been available to Asian women. Conrad Colman · MSIG Europe: “A bearded hipster coming from university.” Colman’s boat was launched in 2007. Against two IMOCAs barely out of commissioning, he could not resist the comparison. “This boat could have graduated from university,” he said. “This boat is sort of a bearded hipster coming from university.” The two-time Vendée Globe finisher leads Aotearoa Ocean Racing’s MSIG Europe campaign aboard the fleet’s only non-foiler. His priorities include developing less experienced sailors, a task complicated by Hume-Merry’s injury and Pirnay’s late promotion from the shore team. “We’re here with the oldest boat and the least experienced team,” Colman said. “That puts a lot more responsibility on me.” Pirnay knows the boat’s mechanics but has never raced offshore, Colman told Boating New Zealand. Choosing somebody already embedded in the team offered more certainty than bringing in an unfamiliar sailor at the last minute. Oliver Heer · Embrace The Challenge: “Now it’s definitely time to go sailing.” Heer’s Swiss campaign occupies the middle ground between the new designs and Colman’s older non-foiler. His 2018 VPLP-designed IMOCA was originally Jérémie Beyou’s Charal before becoming Justine Mettraux’s Teamwork – Team SNEF. It is new to Heer, not new to racing. Heer finished his first Vendée Globe in 2025. For this crossing, he has assembled an experienced crew: Ocean Race winner Marie Riou, offshore veteran Liz Wardley and Lincoln Dews, the team’s performance analyst. After two weeks preparing in Newport and New York, Heer’s assessment was brief: “Now it’s definitely time to go sailing.” The start: Tuesday’s show, Wednesday’s race The New York departure and the competitive start are separate events. The fleet begins leaving Brooklyn Bridge Marina at 11:00 local time on Tuesday, September 1, ahead of the harbour ceremony. The actual race starts from a virtual line 145 miles offshore, reducing the risk of encounters with whales and other marine wildlife in coastal waters. Event New York London / Lisbon Departure show Tuesday, September 1 12:00 17:00 Race start Wednesday, September 2 06:00 11:00 Daily OnBoard Live September 2–8 11:00 16:00 The ETA is around September 8–9, subject to conditions. Lorient’s Ocean Live Park runs from September 9–13. The forecast: enough wind to go fast - possibly too much to break the record The opening forecast is relatively moderate: 12–15 knots from the northeast during the first hours of racing on Wednesday, following lighter conditions on the delivery to the start area. The more demanding conditions come later, depending on the route. “Depending on where you position yourself, you can find up to 45 knots of gusts,” Clapcich said before departure. That is wind speed, not a predicted boat speed. Nor does more wind automatically make a record more likely. The target is 641.13 nautical miles in 24 hours, equivalent to an average of 26.71 knots, set by Malizia in May 2023. A short burst above 30 knots will not do it: the boat must maintain a high average through every manoeuvre, wave impact and sail change. Herrmann explained that the record run depended on an unusually favourable combination of wind angle, manageable seas and a rotating breeze that kept the boat fast for a full day. Stronger wind can instead produce steeper seas, heavier landings and loads that force crews to reduce sail or slow down. “That’s a very rare condition,” he said. There is also a separate, literal speed restriction before racing: Colman described a 10-knot limit during the offshore transit, introduced to protect marine wildlife. That should not be confused with the boats’ racing potential. Once racing begins, the practical limit will be how much speed each crew can sustain without damaging the boat. That is where the new designs must prove themselves — and where the established boats may still have the advantage. Where to follow The departure show, race-start coverage and daily OnBoard Live programmes are available free through The Ocean Race website and YouTube channel, with coverage also on DAZN. The PredictWind race tracker provides positions, boat data, weather information and onboard content throughout the crossing. Watch the averages, not just the speed spikes. The boat that looks fastest for five seconds is not necessarily the one that gets to Lorient first.