The Défi Azimut Solo 48 Hours: 14 boats on the startline including Séb Simon and his brand new IMOCA
by Ed Gorman 16 Sep 16:40 BST
17 September 2026
The brand new Guillaume Verdier-designed Groupe Dubreuil-Air Caraïbes © Groupe Dubreuil
After the spectacular tribute to Charlie Dalin on Tuesday, which saw hundreds of boats parade off the packed seafront at Concarneau in his memory, the focus in the IMOCA Class switches to its annual showcase regatta, the Défi Azimut-Lorient Agglomération which Dalin took part in many times.
This event is well known for its famous speed runs and the Tour of the Ile de Groix, but the big attraction, as always, will be the 48 Hours solo race which features the biggest fleet of the season so far. Fourteen skippers will take the start on Thursday, including three making their IMOCA debut - Pierre-Louis Attwell (Resilient), Davy Beaudart (Bureau Vallée) and Masa Suzuki (Milai-Furuno).
The fleet also includes the debut for the brand new Guillaume Verdier-designed Groupe Dubreuil-Air Caraïbes - the new boat for Sébastien Simon - and the return to competition of Jérémie Beyou's Charal for the first time after substantial modifications to its bow.
Of the 14 boats in total, 10 are foilers, among them Sam Goodchild's MACIF Santé Prévoyance which won the season-opening 1000 Race, and Ambrogio Beccaria's Allagrande MAPEI, which the Italian skipper sailed to victory in the Vendée Arctique-Les Sables d'Olonne in June.
The 48 Hours will trace a route around the Bay of Biscay via a series of virtual marks, with a course is likely to include a range of wind conditions, with a large depression sitting to northwest of Scotland but a large area of light winds spreading into the Biscay too.
For Sebastien Simon, this is his first race since finishing third in the last Vendée Globe and his first race in his new boat, the hull of which features a bustle and is an identical sister of Kojiro Shiraishi's DMG MORI Global One. Regarded as one of the favourites for the podium in the next Vendée Globe, Simon is looking forward to testing his new IMOCA in competition for the first time.
"It's the first race of the boat so yeah, everybody is expecting a lot with this boat and its design, but it's not only a question about the boat," Simon told the Class. "To be honest, I am not fully ready for now. I need to take a bit of time on the boat to be confident with it, but of course I am really happy to do this race."
"It's going to be a good moment," he added, "and I just want to enjoy it because my last race was the Vendée Globe - it was a good one, but it was a long time ago now and we decided to stay focused on the building process of the new boat. So I didn't spend so much time sailing, so now I will pay the price I guess."
Simon is not setting his goals too high. "I will be happy just to finish the race, just show good moments with the boat, good speed and try to execute all the manoeuvres properly and we will see the result after," he said.
Naturally, Simon was following DMG Mori's progress in The Ocean Race Atlantic when Shiraishi and his team started slowly but gradually improved and ended up taking third place. Simon admitted he was worried by DMG Mori's early pace in the race, when going upwind in medium breeze, but was pleased to see it picking up speed later on.
"We know the boat struggles a bit in light wind because the wetted surface is a bit bigger, so we pay that price in light winds," said Simon. "But anyway, during the race, when the wind came back and the boat was reaching, I think they showed really good moments, with good speed compared to all the other boats.
For the Lorient-based skipper, Davy Beaudart, the 48 Hours will be his first solo race in an IMOCA as he continues his build-up to the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe in November. Beaudart has three Solitaire du Figaro campaigns under his belt and has raced two-handed in the IMOCA Class alongside Louis Burton for many years but never on his own.
"I'm very excited, yeah," said Davy Beaudart, who also runs a successful boatyard that has contracts with several IMOCA teams. "Actually...not so much excited as much as I'm in a routine where everything is unfolding pretty much as planned. So the race is the culmination of everything we've built since May. It's going to be really nice, but every stage has been really cool. The race is the tip of the iceberg. I'll probably be a bit stressed at the start, but mostly I'm going to really enjoy it."
We asked Beaudart what he had learnt when racing alongside Burton. "Taming the beast," he replied laughing. "That's really it. These are pretty crazy boats that get out of hand quickly if you don't stay in control, and you really must not let the boat get ahead of you. So you have to learn to sail by anticipating a huge amount and being careful with the boats because they're still fragile. That's mainly what I learned sailing with Louis. Louis also had this strength of never being afraid. That rubbed off on me a bit, and I learned to sail that way too."
Beaudart is leading a busy life with family and business commitments alongside sailing, including this year's Solitaire du Figaro. But he enjoys pushing himself. "I've been juggling my offshore racing projects, professional and family life, everything, for a long time," he explained, standing on the pontoon at La Base next to his black and yellow IMOCA. "I'm someone who doesn't like being bored, so I like to do everything at 100%, and when this boat project was offered to me, I accepted right away, knowing full well it would add more to my plate. But it's going really well and we are managing to do everything we want. I'm very calm and very happy to put in the extra time."
And his objective in this race? "First, it's to get this lovely boat, this Bureau Vallée, back on the water after it had been in the yard for a while. And second, to give everyone some pleasure, to give something back to Bureau Vallée and everyone who took part in the project - some emotion, some enjoyment."
Beaudart is not expecting strong weather. "For the runs, light wind, maybe a bit of a thermal breeze late in the day. On the last run it might pick up a bit, but it'll stay gentle. And for the offshore leg, yes, there's a low-pressure system coming in, but it'll be something fairly light. It's not really a proper depression. It's a front coming through, but it's going to weaken a lot as it reaches the tip of Brittany, so we won't have very strong conditions. It'll be more on the soft side," he said.