Canadian skipper Mike Birch, winner of the first edition of the Route du rhum, died on Wednesday October 26 at his home in Brec’h (Morbihan) at the age of 90, his family said.
“He had been diminished for several months. He died quietly that night in his sleep.said France Birch, wife of the sailor.
98 seconds ahead
Mike Birch made sailing history at the age of 47 by winning the first Route du rhum, in 1978, a solo transatlantic race rallying every four years Saint-Malo (Ille-et-Vilaine) to Pointe -à-Pitre (Guadeloupe).
On board a small yellow multihull of 12 meters (Olympus), the Canadian had beaten the powerful monohull of Frenchman Michel Malinovsky to the wire to win with a lead of only 98 seconds, after more than twenty-three days of racing.
This victory of David against Goliath confirmed the superiority of multihulls over monohulls in offshore racing. She also revealed this atypical runner, shy, of great kindness and modesty.
“He is really the person who forged the legend of the Route du rhum. (…) He was a lover of the sea who wanted to stay free”reacted Hervé Favre, president of OC Sport, organizer of the race.
late passion
Mike Birch was born on the 1er November 1931 in Vancouver (British Columbia) and it was rather late that this former cowboy, rodeo enthusiast, discovered a passion for sailing.
In 1976, at the age of 44, he took the start of the English Transat, aboard Third Turtle, the smallest trimaran in the fleet, designed by American Dick Newick. At the helm of this 9.75 meter multihull, Mike Birch will take second place behind the Frenchman Eric Tabarly and his monohull. Pen Duick VI 22 meters.
Mike Birch, whose slender figure and bald head quickly became famous among sailors around the world, gradually built up an impressive list of achievements, taking part in all the Routes du rhum until 2002 (he was ninth in the age of 71!). He would finish third in 1982, fourth in 1986 and 1990.
Offshore racing world champion in 1991 and 1992, he established himself as one of the rare foreigners to beat the French, who monopolized the event alone in the wake of Eric Tabarly’s victory in the English Transat of 1976.
Gold digger
Mike Birch sailed for about sixty years, but “gold digger was my first job”he told the French sports daily The Team before the start of the Route du rhum 2014. ” Not long. It was an interesting job even though I didn’t earn a lot of money! »
Until last year, he lived between Brittany and his chalet in Gaspé, Quebec, at the mouth of the St. Lawrence, with a Jack Russell by the name of Lucie as his only companion. His state of health deteriorating, he was brought back in July 2021 by his wife to their Breton home. “Before that, despite his age, he continued to sail” with a small monohull called Dollythe nickname of his mother, explained France Birch.
The “Sailing Love Dictionary”, like a hollow self-portrait
Loïck Peyron will have spent almost three years there, and put a lot of heart into it. Of him too – hollow self-portrait – and of all those whose paths he crossed and whom he admired, starting with his father, Hervé, alias Le Commandant (he was a merchant navy commander) and his uncle, Jean -Yves Terlain. In his Sailing lovers dictionary (Plon), we will also find Mike Birch, his Jedi master, who taught him the school of flexibility and the reed (opposed to that of the oak embodied by Eric Tabarly), Jean-Baptiste Le Vaillant, Alain Gautier, Florence Arthaud , alias Mimine, or even Loïck Fougeron, who, by dint of sacrifice, succeeded in entering the closed circle of Cape Horners, and who made him want to add a “k” to his first name. In good place also many architects, to whom Loïck Peyron pays a strong tribute.
Sailing lovers dictionaryby Loïck Peyron (Plon, 544 pages, 26 euros).