Offshore Team Germany re-launched their Owen Clarke designed IMOCA Open 60 in Gosport in the middle of May and undertook her official launch in Kiel in recent weeks. Her final fit out and ‘splash’ comes at the culmination of a year-long period of refit that has seen the yacht transformed from her original 2012 Vendee Globe mode with a new water ballast tank configuration, keel and deck spreader rig. Owen Clarke’s work on the design re-affirms their continuing interest and commitment to IMOCA 60 design and development both for the Vendee Globe and the upcoming Ocean Race (formerly the Volvo Ocean Race).
Owen Clarke, working with the yacht’s original lead composite engineer Fred Louarn (now StrucTeam) have made significant structural modifications to the yacht to allow the fitting of the standardised IMOCA wing rig and ballast system. With engineers PURE (NZ) a new IMOCA compliant keel fin has also been designed, optimised to a new keel cant angle and bulb design developed in tandem with a tank configuration with the intention of fitting of new lifting foils in the near future.
For the time being, the yacht retains the original daggerboard system used in the 2012 Vendee Globe and will race this years Transat Jacques Vabres in this configuration. The team which includes German skipper and Olympian, Robert Stanjek will slowly work up this season while the search for funding to modify the yacht further and enter a team in The Ocean Race.
The OTG 60 is the eighth and most recent of Owen Clarke Design’s IMOCA 60s and was built as Acciona for the 2012 Vendee Globe. OCD designed Open 60s have included Ellen MacArthur’s Kingfisher and Mike Golding’s Ecover’s which have gained the podium in successive Vendee Globes. OCD 60s have won, amongst other events, several OSTARs, Route du Rhum and Defi Trans-Atlantic Races against the leading competition of the day, in terms of both designs and sailors.
For a video of the launch go to www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVyJHmm6n-g
For more information contact racing@owenclarkedesign.com
