Baranger's Open 50 aluminum sailboat, from Défi Intégration to La Voix de l'Océan
Jolokia is an Open 50 (Rhum 50) aluminum sailboat designed by Eric Baranger and built in 2003 by Grand Large Shipyard in Saint-Malo. It competed in two Route du Rhum races under Eric Jail (2014, 2018), holds a mixed crew record Lorient–Mauritius (Défi Intégration, 2010), and has served since 2020 as a platform for La Voix de l'Océan (Eric Letellier, Pierre Bardoux, Longitude 181 association).
Architecture and construction
- Overall length: 15.24 m (50 feet)
- Beam: 5.10 m
- Displacement: 10 t
- Upwind sail area: mainsail 100 m², genoa 70 m²
- Downwind sail area: spinnaker 200 m²
- Aluminum hull, Rhum 50 class
Baranger is the reference architect for Rhum 50 designs and extensively uses aluminum for offshore racing. The choice of aluminum over composite made heavy modifications for Défi Intégration possible without starting from a new design.
Boat achievements
- 2010 — Lorient (Port-Louis, Morbihan) to Mauritius (Port-Louis) via Cape of Good Hope record: 68 days 22 hours 52 minutes 2 seconds, first WSSRC-certified mixed crew ocean record (abled/disabled, Défi Intégration, Eric Bellion).
- 2014 — Route du Rhum, Rhum class, skippered by Eric Jail.
- 2018 — Route du Rhum, Rhum Mono class, skippered by Eric Jail for Longitude 181 (boat renamed for the event as La Voix de l'Océan); race abandoned due to damage.
Conversion to scientific platform
Letellier and Bardoux purchased the boat around 2020 to serve the La Voix de l'Océan program, run with Longitude 181. Under this new flag, Jolokia conducts seawater sampling for university research on nanoplastics (Stony Brook SoMAS, Staffordshire University) alongside awareness campaigns.
The Team Jolokia association (Eric Bellion, Pierre Meisel), sharing the name and inclusive disabled heritage from Défi Intégration, has raced since 2012 on a different boat, a VO60 formerly Djuice Dragons based in Lorient — not to be confused with the Open 50 described here.
