Une Aventure Extraordinaire

The Mini 6.50 Class has been the launch point for many offshore sailors and yacht design developments, with the biennial highlight being the Mini Transat from France to Guadeloupe. It is not a race with much history for North American sailors, but the 24th edition included Peter Gibbons-Neff (USA) for the crossing in 2023.

Molly Winans with SpinSheet magazine profiles his effort:

You can sail solo across the ocean for 19 days fueled by mostly 12-minute naps and not hallucinate. You might even be able to communicate by telepathy. But things go sideways. What you hope to be an astonishing feat may feel like a failure along the way. These are among the lessons I learned from Peter Gibbons-Neff, the only American to cross the finish line of the 4050-nautical-mile La Boulangère Mini Transat Race on November 15.

What’s “mini” about a trans-Atlantic race? The boat: a 21-footer built for racing across the ocean. Sailors who find their way to the “pocket rocket” they call the Classe Mini 6.50 tend to be experienced solo ocean sailors and/or French. Gibbons-Neff was neither. – Full report