Project: The Atlantic loop and the ARC 26/27 onboard Illico

Written By diego moreno

I am super excited to share a major project I’m taking on! We are setting out on a massive sailing adventure—navigating through the Mediterranean, making the classic Atlantic crossing from Gran Canaria to Saint Lucia in the Caribbean, and then sailing all the way back to Europe with plenty of stops on the way. The whole journey is part of the famous Atlantic Rally for Cruisers (ARC)!

The Ride & The Crew

Our home for the next few months is Illico, a fast Swiss-flagged Rapido 40 trimaran. Designed by Morrelli & Melvin and built in Vietnam by Rapido Trimarans, she’s a full carbon fiber boat built for very fast sailing.

A boat this fast takes a great team to run smoothly and I’m pleased to be part of such a great team with Coen van Duiven, Marco Bolognese, Mark Haswell and myself Diego Moreno. Together, the four of us have a solid mix of experience, seamanship, and absolute enthusiasm for fast multi-hull racing.

The Route & Distance

Between our Mediterranean legs, the main transatlantic crossing, and the return trip via ARC Europe, we’re looking at an estimated 7,500 to 8,000 nautical miles total:

  • Leg 1 (Mediterranean & Delivery): Genova - Livorno - around Corsica - Livorno - Gibraltar Gran Canaria (Las Palmas) (~1,500–1,800 NM)

  • Leg 2 (The Main ARC Transatlantic): Las Palmas, Gran Canaria - Rodney Bay, Saint Lucia (~2,700–3,000 NM)

  • Leg 3 (ARC Europe / The Return): Saint Lucia - Martinique - Sint Maarten- Bermuda - Azores - Back to Europe (~3,300–3,500 NM)

Friendly Rivalry: The Battle Against the “other Rapido 40”!

Now, for a bit of racing hype—I have to admit I'm getting completely carried away with the racing vibe already!

We are especially excited to go head-to-head against our sibling boat, the Rapido 40 Racer owned by Richard Eyre. Their boat is a lighter, stripped-down performance version of ours with a taller rig. They might be lighter and theoretically faster on paper, but that just makes us want to beat them even more not to mention all the other hundreds of other boats across the ARC fleet.

The Pre-Race Prep: From Genova to the Refit Yard

Our journey actually kicked off in the boat yard, a few months in Genova, where we headed over to Livorno and took Illico for a run around Corsica before heading right back into Livorno for a long time on the boat yard . Even though we have worked on plenty of Rapidos before, this boat needed tons of love before she was truly ocean-ready.

We had a massive list of repairs and upgrades to knock out. We completely redid the engine, overhauled the rudder and every single one of its components, ordered six brand-new sails from Sail Design, fitted a new spray hood, swapped in all new lines, adjusted the rigging, added extra batteries, installed new solar panels with new carbon structure... the list just went on and on! It was a lot of hard work, and to be honest we still have some much to do… but ready or not, it was time to set sail.

ARC Round 4!

This marks my 4th time taking part in the ARC!

Somehow trimarans that years ago were unknown to me, now has became a huge part of my sailing life over the years, and I’ve been lucky enough to cross the Atlantic on two incredible boats in the past:

  • Minimole 2023 – A Neel 47 trimaran for the main ARC Atlantic leg

  • Picomole 2025 - A Rapido 53xs trimaran that we won the ARC with only 10 days for the crossing.

  • Picomole 2025 – Parts of ARC Europe on the return journey from the Caribbean to Euro

  • Illico 2026 - Now, after all the refit work, we are already on the “road” to take on the Atlantic once again.

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