A large anticyclone centred over northern Germany is unsettling the usual script in the Channel, a pattern meteorologist Cyrille Duchesne describes as unusual for this time of year. With the Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe 2026 start drawing closer, forecasters in Saint-Malo are watching the setup closely. It builds on the picture already flagged days earlier, when the same high pressure system over Germany was producing an irregular easterly airflow, with its grip on the Channel still in question.
High pressure dominating the Channel in late October isn't the norm. It tends to bring settled, quieter conditions rather than the autumn blows sailors might expect ahead of a transatlantic classic.
Duchesne works for METEO CONSULT, the official weather partner of the Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe 2026, and has been tracking how the system will influence conditions in the build-up to the start.
For competitors, the detail matters. Saint-Malo's weather in the days before a Rhum start can shift strategy, sail choice, even departure mood, long before anyone crosses the start line.
The anticyclone's position over northern Germany is the key feature, steering the overall pattern and keeping more unsettled Atlantic systems at bay for now.
Whether that holds is the question occupying forecasters this week.
Duchesne's briefing focuses on how the situation is likely to evolve over the coming days, a period sailors and shore teams alike will be watching closely as preparations sharpen in Saint-Malo, ahead of the fleet's scheduled start at 1.02pm the following Sunday, as 115 skippers prepare to launch the opening leg of their voyage to Guadeloupe.
It's one of a series of regular weather bulletins from METEO CONSULT ahead of the race, giving skippers and followers a rolling picture of what the Channel, and eventually the Atlantic, might throw at the fleet.
For New Zealand followers of the Route du Rhum, used to Kiwi sailors and designers making their mark in the IMOCA and Ultim fleets, these early-season forecasts are a reminder of just how much weather routing shapes a solo transatlantic race long before the gun goes.
