Corentin Horeau has pulled off one of the great tactical masterstrokes in Route du Rhum history, breaking clear of the entire IMOCA fleet mid-course to win the 2025 Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe by a landslide.
The Frenchman crossed the finish line at Pointe-à-Pitre on Wednesday 11 November at 01:14 local time (06:14 French time), completing the solo transatlantic crossing in 9 days, 17 hours, 12 minutes and 9 seconds. That smashes the previous IMOCA race record by 2 days, 24 minutes and 16 seconds, pending ratification by the jury.
He covered 4,073.18 nautical miles at an average speed of 15.14 knots on the direct route, or 17.47 knots in real terms. At 37, it is the finest win of his career, coming barely a year after he first raced under the MACSF colours.
The race turned on a single day. On 2 November, the third day out, Sam Goodchild (MACSF Santé Prévoyance) and Ambrogio Beccaria (Allagrande Mapei) marked each other closely and closed on Sébastien Simon (Groupe Dubreuil - Air Caraïbes), the northernmost boat in the fleet. Horeau was left out front, alone. Nobody realised it then, but the race had probably already been decided.
Horeau's boat sailed into a weather trough. It slowed, like everyone else's, but caught the promised north-north-westerly flow and shot south while the rest of the fleet sat stalled. For more than nine hours, Sam Goodchild, Jérémie Beyou (Charal) and the others were essentially parked.
Horeau, meanwhile, was flying at over 20 knots, firing off ten gybes in succession and building a lead of 234 miles, almost unheard of over the course of a transatlantic race.
The win owed as much to patience as to speed. Horeau won the Solitaire du Figaro in 2023 the same way, holding his nerve when others blinked. He only discovered this IMOCA, the former Paprec Arkéa, last season sailing alongside Yoann Richomme, before taking over the MACSF project this year.
It has not all gone smoothly. He finished 10th in the doublehanded division of the 2025 Transat Café L'Or with Richomme, and retired from the Vendée Arctique in June. But the Trinité-born sailor, who grew up idolising Loïck Peyron, Alain Gautier and Michel Desjoyeaux, kept working without let-up.
The win gives him real belief heading forward. In IMOCA, his rise looks only just beginning.
