September 23, 2015 – Today’s strong winds forced the organizers to abandon racing, leaving them no choice but to keep the boats safely moored in the Vieux Port of Cannes. Since the inception of the Regates Royales de Cannes, owners have always called up professional sailors. Once they were fisherman or seafaring shipmates, today they’re Olympic athletes, America’s Cup, Irc or one-design pro sailors. Tomorrow they will all join a tribute to much missed female offshore legend Florence Arthaud. A total change of scenario for the second day of the Regates Royales – Trophee Panerai. Despite showing they still have what it takes to sail in strong conditions, the 80 plus classic boats gathered in Cannes today could not face the violent westerly mistral that swept the Bay of La Napoule with gust exceeding 30 knots, later and suddenly shifting to the East and topping 35 knots. After a long wait the organizers could do anything but give up and racing was abandoned for the day.
The Regates are a must The Regates Royales are not only a friendly and unique gathering, they are also a great opportunity to run across some world class sailors, regulary featuring on some of the most renowned series worldwide, who for a week enjoy the pleasures of classic yachting. “we come here to have fun. To sail with friends on beautiful boats. The race area is just stunning, the racing exciting as much as the atmosphere ashore. After many years sailing on multihulls, I’ve started sailing in the 8MI clas, on CUTTY and VISION and later on some 12Mi to finally go to classic yachts. I’m now with MOONBEAM IV, I’m the strategist working with the tactician and I help with sail Trimming too. When Victor, the bowman, limbs up the mast I take over his role. It’s super interesting for someone like me, who’s essentially a trimmer.” says Gilles Mallet, former Francois Boucher’s crew mate on the trimaran KER CADELLAC. These magnificent boats, at times exceeding 50 metres in length, can have as many as 25 people on board, each with a specific role to work in sync with each other during maneuvers that could take up to fifteen minutes. “I’ve been sailing on NADA for several seasons now. She’s a 6MI designed by William Fife III in 1929 and every year we take part in the class’ World and European championships. It’s great to mix with the Classics, it’s a real show! But it’s close racing too. I’m helming and not easy to steer these long keeled boats, it’s very difficult from helming a modern boat or a Figaro one-design. But the mix of competition and elegance is what makes the Regates Royales unique.” declares, smiling, offshore expert Alexia Barrier.
Germany rules in the Dragons, after three races, the 38 boat strong Dragon fleet has a new leader. Germany’s Michael Schmidt, Mario Wagner and Stefan Waack (M3) With a third place on the opening day in light airs and a double win yesterday the German crew are in first place with five points, that is is a fourteen point edge on UK’s Ivan Bradbury (BLUE HAZE) who debuted with a clean score but yesterday only got a disappointing fifth and a ninth. British female skipper Gavia Wilkinson-Cox (JERBOA) was definitely more consistant (9,3,2) and is now in second place whilst Italian Guiseppe Duca (CLOUD), who had a good start only finished 29th and will have to rely on discards to get back in the battle for the podium. The “French Armada”, consisting of ten teams out of 38, is having ups and downs on the overall scoreboard, with Jean-Pierre Gailes, Marc Niewbourg and Sebastien Decroix (CHILS DREAM), being the best placed crew in 15th. Hopefully the milder wind conditions expected for Thursday and Friday will enable the committee to launch at last four more races, opening up the game again despite the German’s team’s strong margin.
