Vendée Globe trial, Giancarlo Pedote arrives: here’s how to follow the interview live

We promised you in the last installment of our Vendée Globe Trial that we would try to set up a special interview, with the only Italian skipper who has twice completed the round-the-world trip solo, nonstop.

And so the time has come, today, a few minutes after 6 p.m., as always live on our YouTube channel and on our Facebook page, with our Luca Sordelli and Mauro Giuffrè. It will be a face-to-face chat with Giancarlo, where he will tell us about the emotions, the labors, the victories and the difficulties of this second Vendée Globe. And with him we will of course also talk about his future plans and the state of the art of Italian ocean sailing.

Who is Giancarlo Pedote

Born in Florence in 1975, he graduated in Philosophy in 2002, an instructor since he was 18, his passion for offshore racing came later, after 2005, when he decided to engage in his first Mini 650 campaign. She participated a first time in the Mini Transat in 2009 in the Series category, finishing the transatlantic in fourth position. He tries again in 2012 in the Proto category with the famous 747 and finishes in second position after dominating the race, stopped only by a bowsprit breakage that robs him of victory in the last 48 hours of the race.

From then on he divided his time between Class 40, Moth and Multi 50, before landing in the Imoca 60 class in 2017 and kicking off the project with Prysmian, a sponsor that has followed him for much of his career. The Giancarlo Pedote appreciated in the Imoca 60 class is a sailor perhaps a little different from the one in the years in Mini 650, less attacking and more reflective, but on this change of strategy also counts the fact of having worked in these years always with a very small team and with budgets that have nothing to do with those of the top French teams, which imposed by necessity a different and more prudent conduct in regattas.

Pedote’s undisputed merit is that he has never given up, in any regatta, has always brought the boat to the finish line and has put himself on the line over the past 8 years in the queen class of ocean racing, albeit with a small team and with significant budget constraints. He completed two round-the-world races, eighth in 2020 and 22nd in this tenth edition of the Vendèe Globe, results that today remain the benchmark for Italian ocean sailing.

What will be Giancarlo Pedote’s future in the ocean? It is hard to say right now, and the sailor himself will probably be the one to tell us soon. The wish is that we can see him again, perhaps with a more competitive project and with a newer boat that will really allow him to race and not have to settle for having as his goal to get to the finish line. That is our wish, but much will also depend on Pedote’s willingness to continue on this path and in what way to do so. In any case, thank you Giancarlo for taking Italian sailing to the top.

Mauro Giuffrè