Alan Roura: "To relive the same Vendée Globe, I would sign up immediately"

It feels good to come back to a Les Sables d’Olonne channel where there are so many people, there was more atmosphere than four years ago! Honestly, these last five days of racing have been crazy, we had a great time, and regardless of the result we all had fun. I have a great boat, I have a great team, I am very proud, and I have finished my third Vendée Globe, and that is great! I came back to have fun again, and I am really happy to finish like this…
 

Not at all, I didn't set out for that. If someone had said to me at the beginning of November "are you signing up for an 18th place, where you get passed by two boats with straight daggerboards 15 minutes from the finish line", I would have said no thanks. But to relive the same Vendée Globe that I experienced, I would sign up again right away. I believe that deep down the ranking is not the most important thing. I regret not having been able to compete with certain boats. I would have liked to experience and live the intensity of the leading pack, but I know that we experienced the same intensity in the pack behind. I am not satisfied, but each Vendée Globe I improve my time by ten days, so in four years, there might be a way to do something… (laughs)
 

I started off as a beginner in ocean racing. When I did my first Vendée in 2016, I had no idea what I was getting into, and I had an extraordinary Vendée Globe. Four years later, I wanted to come back to do better, and I had some damage, I didn’t take it very well, it's hard, and I suffer on my round the world race. This time I came back, I'm not doing as well in the ranking, but I still had a lot of fun, and I progressed further in everything. It's a lot of work just to be in the Vendée Globe, and what I want to remember is the pride of being where I am today.
 

You are always still mastering a boat, it's never over. Mine crashes a lot, it's no secret. Life on board is very difficult, so you hurt yourself inside, but I enjoyed hurting myself. I love this boat, it's the Aston Martin of the seas, it looks crazy, it's crazy, I love it. I'm very proud to have made it go around the world. Four years ago, it stopped in Cape Town, so I did better than Alex Thomson, and that's already not bad (laughs)!

 

I had a failed option, yes, I fully accept it. There are four of us who did things differently: I was with Giancarlo Pedote, and there was Conrad Colman and Jean Le Cam who went east of the Azores. All the routings showed the route paying right down to the last file. For a long time, I would have taken that as an excuse, to say that it's because of that that I missed my race, but in this Vendée Globe I really don't want to do that, really not to sum it up as that. I fought all the time, I made I don't know how many comebacks, I gave it my all from start to finish. Today there are about ten boats that are untouchable with exceptional sailors. Before the start, I was roughly with Romain Attanasio and Damien Seguin, and in the end, they are not that far away. When your name is Alan Roura and you miss an option, you are told that you missed it. When your name is Jean Le Cam and you miss an option, you are told that you were unlucky. I tried things, not always the right ones, but the most important thing is that I did not let myself get down, and I am proud of that.

For this Vendée Globe I worked a lot, but what hasn't changed is that I'm here at the start, and I'm here at the finish. So yes, I'm not up there in pure performance, but I've raced with lots of boats, and that's great. I always want to go faster, to learn, and what's good about the Vendée Globe is that you never stop learning. At 31, I've done three. At Cape Horn, I said to myself "it's over, never again, it's too hard". In the Azores, I found myself with Benjamin and Tanguy, and I said to myself "but it's great, I love it, see you in four years". Each Vendée Globe has a special memory, and each Vendée Globe represents a part of my life. It can't be explained, we live for this race. Vendée Globe:
 

Yes, I watch everyone, because there is competition everywhere and especially crazy stories everywhere. It is very interesting to watch, to see the strategies, but even well before that, to already see how the projects are set up. Because just being at the start is really not nothing. All the finishers of the Vendée Globe have merit, it is not insignificant. There are boats and sailors who will arrive tired, with lots of things to tell. You take a Guirec Soudée who has been in all the storms, the guy is sick, I love it... That's really what I like about the Vendée Globe, it's all these stories...
 

I'm going to take over from another Vendée Globe that took place on land, that of my wife, who deserves much more credit than me, because I sailed, and she did everything else. And I'm going to do a bit of cycling, because I have no more legs!