Sailing

New Zealand’s Peter Blake and Britain’s Robin Knox-Johnston will lead a bid to win the Jules Verne Challenge Trophy and $1 million by sailing around the world in less than 80 days, starting next January from the English Channel. The competition was announced in France this week by the Association Tour du Monde En 80 Jours.

Blake won the Whitbread Round-the-World Race in 1989-90 on the 85-foot monohull ketch Steinlager 2 and managed New Zealand’s America’s Cup campaign at San Diego this year. The record for a nonstop circumnavigation under sail is 109 1/2 days, set by France’s Titouan Lamazou in a 59-foot monohull in 1989-90. Blake and Knox-Johnston will sail an 85-foot catamaran, slightly modified since it set a 24-hour record of 520 miles, averaging 21.7 knots.

Blake said the most direct route would require them to average 12.8 knots, but that they’ll probably choose a route with more favorable winds that will require them to average 14.8 knots.