Sailing Myth Brought To Earth -- Commodore Explorer Goes Around The World, Breaking 80-Day Barrier

When Phileas Fogg returned to London to claim a wager made during a card game, the hero's homecoming thrilled Victorian readers to whom such adventure appeared pure literary fantasy. Fogg had completed a whirlwind trip around the globe in what had seemed the impossible time of 80 days.

As the 4-minute mile once appeared to a runner, mile-a-minute speed to a motorcar driver, or even the 730-mph sound barrier to the early airplane pilots, the figure of an 80-day circumnavigation of the globe remained a mythical one to sailors for 120 years.

An impossible task.

So when the crew of Commodore Explorer, including three French sailors and a New Englander, arrived on the west coast of France recently, having destroyed the old circumnavigation record by 30 days - and beaten the 80-day mark by nearly 18 hours - it is no wonder the entire country went, and is still going . . .

"Bonkers," said Cam Lewis, the 35-year-old Newport, R.I., sailor who grew up in Sherborn, in a telephone interview from La Baule. "This arrival has been just unbelievable."

How big was it?

It was so big that literally every medium in France led its news with the arrival of 36-year-old French skipper Bruno Peyron and crew aboard Peyron's 85-foot catamaran.

Peyron is holder of both the trans-Atlantic record of 6 1/2 days and now the Jules Verne Trophy signifying his sub-80-day rounding.

How big was it?

The tumult surrounding the arrival of the Explorer led Lewis to comment upon sailing into Brest, where tens of thousands turned out to line every foot of waterfront: "This is bigger than Lindbergh" - comparing the greeting to that for the first solo flight across the Atlantic.

But it is not only shorebound spectators who now look at the feat in wonder. In 1986, as he was becoming the first U.S. sailor to solo around the world, setting a record of 150 days, Maine's Dodge Morgan had plenty of time to think about the fastest times possible for such a voyage.

"When we did it (Morgan and his 60-foot cutter, American Promise), speed was not the objective. Durability was. But I felt that if someone made (speed) the real objective, they could do it in 100 days."

After hearing of the Explorer's feat, Morgan kept interspersing his talk with chuckles of incredulity.

"It's just incredible," he said. "They had to be going 14 knots the whole time. This has to be the most significant sailing feat in history."

Since Morgan's time with American Promise, the rounding time has dropped steadily, though his challenge was the toughest possible because it was solo and nonstop.

French sailor Philippe Jeantot soon broke Morgan's record for rounding in the BOC race, though this quadrennial rounding makes three stops between start and finish, giving sailors repair and relaxation time.

By 1990, the record had shrunk to 109 days, set by another French sailor, Tituon Lamazou, in his 59-foot monohull, Ecuriel d'Aquitaine II. But, by this time, physical limits were seeming to appear right where Morgan predicted, about 100 days.

Lamazou in the 1990 Globe Challenge said that his winning average of 9.49 knots over about 25,000 miles required pushing crew and equipment at maximum levels for the entire voyage.

But, by then, in France, where grand prix distance sailing is nearly the equivalent of the U.S. space program in terms of research and development, and in terms of the hero status sailors achieve, the advent of multihull sailing was well advanced into long-term passages.

When Lamazou proposed a Jules Verne Trophy race as an open-class blast around the globe in search of a new record, and if possible the 80-day mark, three groups responded - Peyron in Commodore (which achieved full financial sponsorship within three days of campaigning); another French veteran, Olivier de Kersauson in his 89-foot trimaran, Charal; and New Zealand's Peter Blake in his 85-foot catamaran, ENZA New Zealand. (ENZA stands for "Eat New Zealand Apples," obviously the sponsor.)

On Jan. 31, they were off around the world. There was talk of a million-franc prize, but no one has yet come forward to the winner with the cash.

By the time they got into the mid-Atlantic it was clear that Morgan's reflection was right on.

"It's a question of the line between durability and speed. You can't go over it."

And Jeantot also predicted: "If the boats don't break, they can do it."

Early on, two boats broke, as Charal in February hit an unidentified floating object taking her out of the race, followed by a similar misfortune that stopped New Zealand in the Southern Ocean.

But whether luck or seamanship, Explorer survived the many hazards at sea, though according to Lewis, "the cat was down to four lives."

One storm in the Southern Ocean nearly capsized Explorer; a large wave cracked a hull; another surprise storm in February nearly drove them on the rocks of Cape Horn; a collision with a whale ruined one of the daggerboards; and finally, in the final week of the voyage, a T-bone collision with a floating log stopped the cat dead in the Atlantic. From nine to four lives.

"Bruno is amazing," says Lewis. "All that experience. He just knows how to keep from pushing the boat too hard, when to reef, when to change our angle to reduce pounding, even if it takes us off our direction. That knowledge comes from all the miles he's had in these (multihulls)."

Amid the tumultuous crowd greeting the cat's arrival was Lewis' family, and Molly, to whom he proposed marriage aboard Explorer the night before the voyage began. The couple will wed in Newport on May 23, and then?

More sailing, of course. If an 85-foot cat is fast, how does a 120-footer sound? Plans are under way.