(La Trinite-sur-Mer, France)- The idyllic Brittany setting of La
Trinite-sur-Mer was the base for the sixth edition of the Tour de
Belle-Ile race in the Bay of Quiberon, Saturday, 4th May. Sunshine and
pleasant spring temperatures suggested that this was going to be an
excellent event; the issue proved to be the wind. While a thermal breeze
was forecast, a frontal sequence, with cirrus and alto-cumulus cloud
led to a battle which lasted for most of the day, depriving contestants
of the fuel for their sails, namely wind.
The start was something of an anti-climax, after all the waiting, at the
monohull end of the line, where there was some urgent motoring to get
back behind the line before the start in a few cases! It was obvious
from the start that the on-going wind battle was not going to provide
enough breeze for competitors to complete the Tour de Belle-Ile.
Mid-afternoon, as the leader Spindrift approached the Poulains (famous
from the photographs of them in storms by the Plissons and others) at
the western end of Belle-Ile, the race committee decided to finish the
Tour at this location.With the light winds it appeared that this would be a small boat race. Almost all the entrants finished the shortened race; only about 40 of the 476 competing decided to abandon. The RC PRO wisely decided to postpone the start until 1330 hrs, even then the breeze was just 2-3 kts of wind. In general, the J/Teams performed very well in the race.
For the J/80 one-design class, Yannick Tabarly's PROXEO too the win by nearly five minutes over his nine other classmates. Second was Eric Bastard sailing SENJI, third Jean-Marie Liot on STARTIJENN (he's also a famous French photo-journalist), in fourth was Alexandre Bigot sailing CENTRALE-SUPELEC and in fifth was Alexandre Soroko skippering JAM SESSION.
The setting of La Trinité-sur-Mer is ideal, with the town and sailing-related shops immediately across the road from the large marina. The race village was set up by the marina, about 500 metres from the local yacht club, the Societe Nautique de la Trinité. The larger monohulls and multihulls were just the other side of the breakwater from the marina, close to the Capitainerie (Harbour Master's office), so everyone was together - something that most events do not manage to achieve.
Amidst a range of sponsors, Land Rover France came on board (before the Extreme Sailing Series announcement of Land Rover as a partner) - and we would like to recommend to Sodebo, by means of this article, that they extend their sponsorship from the participation of the maxi-trimaran in the event to providing food and sponsoring the event itself. Surely the national and regional TV coverage alone would make this worthwhile, quite apart from the range of people to be found in a fleet of 476+ boats!
The
Tour de Belle-Ile is growing in popularity from year to year, and it is
easy to see why. The event is smaller than the Bol d'Or on Lake Geneva
and far smaller than Britain's JP Morgan Round the Island Race, but has a
strong and building following. The race was put back by a weekend this
year, into early May, to try to aid entries for another event along the
coast a weekend earlier, but that had to be cancelled for lack of
entries. However, the Tour de Belle-Ile took place comfortably alongside
the Grand Prix Guyader further west, in Douarnenez, near Brest, where
many amateur and professional teams are doing battle. Some crews
continued from the Tour de Belle-Ile to compete in the Grand Prix, while
others left their boats in La Trinité ready for the ArMen Race next
weekend. Thanks for contribution from Anne Hinton @ SailRaceWin. For more Tour de Belle-Ile sailing information
