Royal Ocean Racing Club
11th RORC Transatlantic Race : Bryon Ehrhart’s Juan K 88 Lucky set a new race record
lundi 20 janvier 2025 –
Bryon Ehrhart’s Juan K Maxi 88 Lucky (USA) crossed the finish line outside Camper & Nicholsons Port Louis Marina, Grenada on Monday 20th January 2025 at 09:19:41 UTC.
Taking Monohull Line Honours for the 2025 RORC Transatlantic Race, Bryon Ehrhart was presented with the IMA Transatlantic Trophy by IMA Secretary General, Andrew McIrvine.
Lucky’s elapsed time eclipsed the record set by VPLP 100 Comanche in 2022 by 01 hour 25 minutes to set a new RORC Transatlantic Race Monohull Race Record of 07 Days 20 Hrs 34 Mins and 41 Secs.
Lucky crew : Bryon Ehrhart, Antonio Cuervas mons, Brad Butterworth, Brian Giorgio, Charlie Enright, Chris Lefferdink, Daniele Raddavero, Dean Phipps, Joca Signorini, Jonathan Clough, Jonathan Rankine, Juan Vila, Peter Van Niekerk, Rodney Daniel, Sam Mason, Samuel Rosenbaum, Scott Beavis, Simon Daubney, Stuart Wilson, Will McCarthy.
“The breeze picked up for the last third, but honestly, six hours from the finish we did not think we would make the record. Comanche is a boat that we have great respect for ; it’s good to see that we can actually perform to a level that is a little bit better than they did, but not by much !” commented Bryon Ehrhart.
“This is the longest race that we have done and it is a beautiful racecourse. The RORC organise great races and the RORC Transatlantic Race is a very desirable way to come to the Caribbean to take part in the RORC Caribbean 600. On Lucky we have a very experienced and senior leadership group making the boat go fast all the time, so the boat does what it’s supposed to do at all times. We’ve had tight spots in this race, especially a light patch of wind in the second third, but we fought through.”
“We went north of Canaries because we were looking to get the righthand shift that would be coming from the west, and we managed to also get a little bit of an acceleration close to La Palma. This has been a very long VMG race, we only went upwind in the last few miles. The boat and the crew did an amazing job. We’re very happy that we managed to break the record because it means a lot to Bryon and the crew. You know it’s a lot of work and to put together the whole program is not straight forward.
“Juan Villa did an awesome job placing ourselves in some really good positions in terms of the shifts and the best pressure, and sometimes playing with clouds. The last big decision was approaching Barbados. Juan was very confident that we would find more pressure north of Barbados and we did. Conditions changed quite abruptly in terms of direction and the wind speed got up to 29 knots. The crew work was just unbelievable, we were running along the edge of a shift requiring a lot of high speed manoeuvres."
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