Paul Meilhat: “I’m not just going for the finish, I’m going out there to get a result!”

Pretty good! It's true that we had a difficult summer, after a… complicated spring (laughs)! But we rose to the challenge, and the boat's behavior is promising, so as is often the case from the negative comes the positive, and in the end these last few months have been a great success for the team.

It was significant. This project was planned for two years before the Vendée Globe, with a reasonable budget. It was already ambitious to be on a new boat, so we didn't have the possibility of doing much development. Our option was to sail a lot. This breakage at the beginning of the year changed the situation. At the time, it was obviously a blow to morale, things were badly damaged, it would have been very expensive to repair especially with an unknown on the result with a foil that had already shown a weakness. Buying a second-hand foil was unthinkable. In the end, we said to ourselves that, even if we were going to spend a lot of money, we might as well make it an opportunity to launch a new pair of foils, knowing that ours were still old and took a long time to produce. And that stimulated us with the team, we found the solution with Manuard foils, like on Boris Herrmann's or Samantha Davies' boats. That wasn't in the initial plans, that's for sure, but it allowed us to make a really technical innovation on the boat. 

Yes, I took out a loan for that. We had to decide very quickly, it's my role as the business leader to manage this budgetary part. Afterwards, it's a bet that is made rationally because a new pair of foils adds value to this boat. I didn't take this decision lightly, but I absolutely don't regret having done it.

Eight years ago, I was a Figaro sailor. My Vendée Globe project was built for me, I benefited from it, it was great because I was very surrounded and supported, but I wasn't really involved in it. There was a lot of freedom on my part it was very pleasant in that aspect! Now, it's the opposite. I built this project 100%, I chose the boat as well as I did my team and my program. But in return, there is the weight of responsibility. It is not easy every day, it makes a lot of grey hairs in two years, and I am not sure that I could keep up this pace for ten other projects. But this time, I I know exactly why I'm doing it, and everything I owe to the people who are with me. And then at least, I'm in the Vendée Globe rhythm, the constant problem management, we've really de-dramatized it!

I don't have specific objectives but general objectives. Let's be clear, this is a real sporting project, I'm not going out there just to finish even if I obviously want to finish. I'm going out there to get a result, that's always been stated, it's a competitive project. Afterwards, I also want to assume my values, and embody them. The Vendée Globe is a race of compromises. I remain convinced that what causes problem is the decision on where to place your cursor, and especially how to keep it consistent. What I really want is to be focused from start to finish with a roughly the same high average pace.

It's funny because it wasn't necessarily my strength when I was younger, and it's not necessarily the case on land either. But sailing has made me develop enormously in this area, and above all the sea has improved me. Solo sailing allows you to learn about yourself, you can't hide from others or behind others. You have to learn to take things as they come, always have a goal to overcome the negative, stay in action. And finally it has become a point on which I feel quite serene.

Inevitably we always do solo race around the world! But these are apprehensions that I can digest much better. It's hard to describe, but now it calms me down more than it makes me anxious. In fact, I am almost more afraid of what we experience on land than at sea. Society is more uncertain and destabilizing, it is another type of hostility than the elements we face. Violence is not always where we think it is.

I would describe it as a boat that we wanted to keep simple, it is quite light and refined. It is a philosophy of simplicity that I like. The idea is that when it is simple, it is easier to be able to sail with a free mind, working with the essential. I have a reputation for not liking comfort because my boat is quite simple in terms of ergonomics, but in fact it's not that I don't like comfort, it's just that I can't stand gadgets. The little tweaks that are supposed to save you energy but in fact make you lose ten times more as soon as they start to stop working. Basically, I don't need a button to press, I prefer to operate directly.

That's a difficult question, because we're always taking steps forward and backward. On The Transat CIC, I showed that I could be in the match. What's really interesting is that the foils came in in 2016, and were more developed in 2020 but were not reliable enough to create a real gap in the result of the last Vendée Globe. But this time, we feel that we have reached a real maturity, there is a form of mastery, and there are many of us who have this advanced technology and are getting closer in terms of the level.  Honestly, we often feel like we are sailing in the Figaro again because we are in a compact fleet, it is extremely stimulating. And I hope to have my place in this fleet, as far up the front as possible. 

There are plenty, we have covered so many miles in three years! There is the finish of the Route du Rhum, we had just launched the boat just before that and I finished eighth. Rounding Cape Horn on The Ocean Race, or arriving in Genoa, that whole race was still a crazy adventure, and I am extremely proud that we managed to complete it. And then overall, all these flying sensations. This is my first foiling boat, it's still something crazy in the life of a sailor to have a boat like this in your hands.

I started dreaming about it two or three months after I had to abandon the first one. Before that, it was too early, it was too difficult. And as for the moment when I believed in it, frankly, there is no romantic exact moment, probably it was at the law firm when I signed the fifty pages of the contract with Biotherm. An IMOCA project today, especially on a competitive project like this, it's such a big machine that you can't really dream about it until you have the funding for it. But all of this takes a long time to work on, it doesn't just depend on us, but it's up to us to get the machine going and deploy all our energy for it. But it takes time. And besides, if you think you're asking me if I'm already thinking about the next Vendée Globe, I'll tell you right away that those who answer that question are telling you lies. The truth is that we can't think about it yet, we're living too deeply what we have to live, and that's already massive.