In 1998, Cammas was asked by Groupama Insurance to helm Groupama and Groupama 2—both ORMA 60 trimarans—and dominated this mainly inshore 60-ft racing class of multihulls. When designing Groupama 3, Marc Peteghem and Vincent Prevost scaled up their original ORMA 60 concept to G-Class size.

Franck Cammas was a young, up-and-coming sailor when he was spotted by the Groupama Insurance Group and hired to helm the company’s 60-ft ORMA trimarans, Groupama 1 and Groupama 2, on the Multicup circuit. In 9 years of inshore racing, Cammas has been nearly unbeatable with 46 podiums and 26 first positions in 53 races. He is also a 4-time ORMA World Champion. Now skipper of the Harken-equipped G Class Groupama 3, Cammas is in search of ocean records, but will continue to race Groupama 2 on the ORMA class circuit where he was so successful.

Groupama 3 is shorter than other boats in the ‘G’ fleet, but much wider and half the weight of its catamaran rival Orange II, the holder of the Jules Verne (around the world) Trophy—a record high on Groupama 3’s ‘to break’ list. Groupama’s shorter length, wide stable platform, and lighterweight philosophy generates enormous sail power that must be controlled. Unlike Orange, this boat is optimized to sail fastest in the lighter 10- to 20-knot winds of the Atlantic, but will need to reef sooner than its rival in the Southern Ocean. This design strategy has already proven a record setter.

Groupama 3 left January 24th for its Jules Verne Trophy attempt: www.cammas-groupama.com

TAMING THE BEAST

In April 2005, three key members of the Groupama team traveled to Harken Pewaukee for intense brainstorming with Harken engineering on building gear to control and transform Groupama’s power into forward motion.

ENGINEERING MANAGER STEVE ORLEBEKE TALKS ‘G’ CLASS

Mainsheet System—Safe Working Load 44,300 lbs. (22 Tons)

Harken decided to create a CRX-mega traveler on Groupama 3. Mega multihulls had already successfully circumnavigated using this traveler, and Harken felt it could handle the predicted mainsheet load of 22 tons. These cars use roller bearings instead of conventional ball bearings to handle the boat’s huge sheet loads. The high-load roller bearings also allowed Harken to design six short curved-race (the track the bearings ride in) cars for easy travel and even loading on the horizontally bent mainsheet track (curved track follows the arc of the boom for consistent sheet tension when trimming) asked for by the Groupama team. All block attachments and car-to-car connections are ‘soft’ spliced ropes and LOUPS™ for strength and to save weight.

Battcar System—Safe Working Load 2270 kg (5005 lb), Car Weight .8 kg (1.76 lb)

The Groupama Harken Battcar system is the smallest and lightest we have ever designed for a boat this size. The mainsail is huge—356 meters2 (3,832 ft2). To reef and control this huge sail was a must, making a free-running ball bearing system the only option.

The Groupama team wanted an 80-mm-wide Battcar system that fit the back of their wing mast. Harken began by choosing a track fastener diameter and then made the track as narrow as possible, but still able to fit the fasteners. Ball bearings were downsized from 12 to 10 mm and track bearing race angles made into a tighter "V" shape to increase load-carrying capacity. The result was a track width of 38 mm and batten cars 90 mm wide.

Blocks and Sheaves—Safe Working Load 100 kg (220 lb) to 11,338 kg (12.5 Tons)

All blocks are custom-tailored to the boat’s specific loads. For example, a 1.61 kg (3.5 lb) runner block has an SWL of 11,338 kg (12.5 tons), while the mainsheet block has an SWL of 6349 kg (7 tons). This style of block was developed for the America’s Cup—simple, reliable and efficient at high loads. Many feature drilled-out center pins so a safety lashing can be installed through the block center. All sideplates are CNC-machined of high-grade titanium for strength. A lot of the sheaves, especially fixed halyard sheaves in the mast, feature tulip-shaped grooves. These groove shapes help guide lines into the sheaves at off angles and prevent chafe on the sheave boxes.

Floating Jib Block—Safe Working Load 9070 kg (10 Tons), Weight 2.22 kg (7 lbs)

Groupama 3’s dimensions and sailplan place the jib clew right over the net with no place to bolt down hardware to trim the headsail. This was solved on the Orma 60 Groupama 2 by suspending a floating block on a soft bridle anchored between the amas and main hull. To change the twist of the sail, crew tension the bridle to lower the jib block. Bridle tension goes up exponentially as the block gets lower.

Harken used this same principal on Groupama 3, but had to design the block to function well under enormous loads—10 tons for the jib sheet. At the same time, we had to keep the system lightweight. Harken used high-strength materials such as titanium for the main structure. Soft, lightweight LOUPS™ were used as attachments because they can articulate under load.

Harken Winches (...more)

Four powerful 1130STR racing winches (two primary and two secondary) on each side of the cabintop control a confusing tangle of lines that lead aft to the cockpit. Groupama also uses three 880.3STR winches—one for the mainsheet and two for the running backstays and mainsheet traveler controls. All seven winches are connected by two horizontal pedestals instead of standard belt-drive transmissions and gear boxes for a lighter-weight system that needs much less maintenance.