It’s impossible not to be impressed by Pierre-Louis Attwell, who has entered the IMOCA Class this year determined to make his mark not only as a sailor with the dream of competing in the next Vendée Globe, but also as a highly effective campaigner for people assailed by what he calls “invisible disabilities.”

The 29-year-old Frenchman, who was born in the Morbihan but brought up near Honfleur in Normandy where he set up the local sailing school, has spent his life contending with Crohn’s disease, an incurable relapsing chronic bowel condition that affects up to 10 million people around the world.

As a highly successful sailor in Class 40 over the last five years - he was class champion in 2024 - Attwell has used his professional sailing career to highlight the plight of fellow sufferers and demonstrate that, despite the condition, those who live with Crohn’s can still achieve great things.

But with the step to IMOCA, and the more international scope of the Class, Attwell is now broadening his message. This time it’s not about Crohn’s specifically, but reaching out to everyone around the world who carries with them a serious medical condition that might not be visible on the surface.

Attwell speaks passionately about his cause and on behalf of a remarkable coalition of more than 25 pharmaceutical companies and research institutions who have supported him in Class 40 and who are now beginning their IMOCA journey with him under the team name IMOCA Resilient.

“The Vendée Globe is the sporting heart of our project,”Attwell explains in fluent English. “It is of course a race around the world, but for me it is also a way to carry strong messages for all the patients with invisible disabilities, to show them you can have dreams and you can transform these dreams into real life projects.

“You know,”he continued, “most of our sponsors are American companies and of course they understand a transatlantic race, but the symbol of doing the round the world race, when you are in the Southern Ocean with no help possible, that is really a step. And that’s why we decided to make the step from Class40 to the IMOCA Class - to change a little bit our messages which before were really around digestive disease.”

So how has he gone about it? Attwell spotted an opportunity to get into IMOCA with the price of older boats comparing well with the cost of building a new Class40. With his longtime sponsor group happy to begin a new chapter in their relationship with him, he went for Tanguy Le Turquais’ former Lazare - originally DCNS designed by Finot-Conq in 2007 - a well-travelled daggerboard boat, and its former owner has been a big help with the transition.

“We have a very nice buyer-seller relationship with Tanguy,”said Attwell, who has found the IMOCA Class and its skippers welcoming to him as a newcomer. “He is not just selling us a boat - we realised he is really happy to hand over this boat and to help us understand how everything works. He has helped us with lots of different subjects and has been sailing with us on our first navigations.”

The plan this season is to take it step-by-step. Attwell will use the 1,000-nautical mile Drheam Cup in July as his solo qualifier for the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe, then take part in the Défi Azimut-Lorient Agglomération in September, before lining up for his first race start in IMOCA at St Malo for the Route du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe in November.

He has been enjoying making the step to IMOCA, albeit to a non-foiler, and has been adjusting his performance objectives from being in contention for podiums in Class40 to focusing on the daggerboard fleet in the 60ft Class.“Of course it is a bigger boat, it is also a boat with more complex systems, such as a turning mast and a canting keel, so we have lots of things to discover,” Attwell explained. “But in the end, after a few days sailing on the boat, I am learning how to manage it. It seems it is quite a normal boat - it’s just a little bit more complicated to maintain, which is also why we have to find people to help us in this transition.”

Attwell was inspired as a youngster by the example of Damien Seguin who showed you could sail solo around the world despite having only one hand. In recent years he credits his fellow Normandy sailor and IMOCA skipper Louis Duc with helping him understand how to build his project, manage it and deal with sponsors. There can be no doubt that the young skipper of IMOCA Resilient has learnt his lessons well, especially when it comes to sponsors, because he has managed to build a coalition of companies to support him that are otherwise market competitors. They include some of the biggest pharmaceutical and biotech companies in the world, among them Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Lilly, Mayoly and AbbVie.

One interesting aspect of the support Attwell enjoys is that, with the move to IMOCA, he is finding that rather than just dealing with the French arms of international pharmaceutical companies, he is now finding himself talking to their global management teams. “For example, this week I was in Berlin to meet the American guys from AbbVie,” explained Attwell, “so we hope that the international races, especially the IMOCA races that start or end in America in 2028, and the international part of IMOCA with its international audience, will help to grow our project and we may be able to go to a foiler for the next Vendée Globe in 2028.”

Taking on the Vendée Globe with a condition like Crohn’s, which can flare up at any moment with potentially serious consequences, is an onerous undertaking. But Attwell sees only an opportunity to show what can be achieved. “The medical risks are part of the message and part of the interest of the goal of doing this kind of race,”he said. “It’s about how you prepare with the difficulties to overcome caused by my disease. And it’s also a complete work with all my medical team - with my doctor, with my nutritionist, my surgeon and nurses.

“For me it is also very interesting to be able to give really concrete, real life solutions to carry in our messaging. It’s not just saying ‘yes, you can do a round the world race, you can realise your dream.’ That’s fine. The important thing for me is to show how you do that, and one of the ways is to use innovation to go beyond difficulties, to go beyond borders.” Attwell gives the example of a new intestinal ultrasound device that he hopes to use on board to allow doctors to assess his condition remotely.

“Also,”he adds, “we have to think about what can happen during the race and what kinds of solutions, especially medical solutions like drugs or treatment, we carry on board for this race. So it’s very interesting and, for me, it is a way to carry a strong message for people living with invisible disabilities to show how you can overcome the difficulties.”

Ed Gorman