Flanders entry Elke works her way out of a rough Needles Channel in the round the island stage of the Commodores’ Cup. This was perhaps the series when these optimised Bénéteaus finally started to run out of puff under IRC – although only a few years back Géry Trentesaux described the optimised First 44.7 he then raced as the ‘best IRC boat I ever sailed’. That of course was before he bought his current JPK 10.80 Courrier du Leon…
the quality of their ‘weak link’, Goa(seventh) and Elke(eighth) in class 1, whereas Lann Aël 2(France White) finished 16th and Stamina(France Red) in 15th. 3. The small ratings in front Conventional wisdom, that it is best to be the biggest boat in your class, proved completely wrong at this regatta: in class 1 three of the top four boats had the lowest ratings. In class 2 the top two boats had low ratings. There were three races where the two fleets had the same course and the same start; I calculated overall placings for these three races on corrected time with the result that the five top boats were from class 2, followed by Teasing Machine, followed by the three lowest- rating boats in class 1…
If I wanted an easy life I would design boats like the others French naval architect Bernard Nivelt had a lot of designs at the Commodores’ Cup. His A35, now 10 years old, did pretty well, as did his JND35 sailing for Israel, not forgetting Teasing Machine, top big boat. But his two new JND 39s, which are near-sisterships (Staminais a bit lighter with a little more sail than Lan Aël 2) achieved a disappointing final score. There were various theories to explain that. First is that these are both very light IRC designs (two tons lighter than Goa, for example) and so are more ‘delicate’ to sail. ‘Two years ago,’ reminds Bernard, ‘Teasing Machinealso did both very badly and very well in the Commodores’ Cup. After the competition the boat came back to La Rochelle and we worked hard to optimise her wherever possible, including introducing a number of new sail designs.’
because he knows Daniel is quite a clever man on the water. But the other JPK 10.10s in other teams were never a concern to the fast Foggy Dew crew.
Very happy with the one-week format of intense racing, and with the high level of organisation on the water, Noël, a RORC champion again in 2016, intends to keep on racing in the Channel and in the Solent for the rest of the season. He is retiring at the end of August and is looking forward to more time afloat… Noël is never happier than when he is on his little winning ‘green boat’. Jean-Yves Le Goff, sailing his Nivelt-designed A35 Realax for France Rouge, was also a happy man: ‘It was a beautiful week of navigation that did not finish badly for us.
‘We did well by winning the Offshore Trophy. A super week on a super playground, and with two team-mates with a very good spirit who always did the best job they possibly could. We are ready to come back again in two years looking for a podium, because this year we finished only fourth!’
Statistics
Marc Alperovitch, skipper of the JPK 10.80 Timeline, made some calculations after the finish: 1. France rules the waves In each of the two classes, the top three boats are French, one from each team. We can thus really speak about French domination in this competition. 2. The ideal team for France and the weak link The ideal Team France would have been made up of Foggy Dew (JPK 10.10), Pen Koent (First 40.7 – now 20 years old) and the A35 Realax. It would have finished 60pt in front of Flanders and, paradoxically, does not contain any boat from the winning France Blue team. The victory of France Blue and the second place of Flanders were decided by
Today Teasing’s all-round performance is satisfactory It is harder to sail a light boat in a mainly heavy-displacement fleet because she slows down so rapidly. Like the A13 two years ago, the two JND 39s had not sailed much before the event; Stamina only launched in May. The boat, helmed in the regatta by Andrew Hurst, broke a poorly made bowsprit three times; more significantly, a simple cruiser-style runner system meant her crew was never able to achieve much headstay tension. ‘Our sistership Lan Aël 2 has normal 3:1 runners and at times she was as much as 3-4° higher upwind,’ reckoned the editor of Seahorse. ‘We only became competitive, in fact often quite a bit faster, offshore and in big seas when a tight headstay became a bit less critical. We were also a lot better reaching.’ In light weather these wide and flat – but powerful – designs became quite difficult, the two JND 39s trailing the fleet by a big distance when the final inshore race was abandoned as a flat calm descended on the fleet. ‘Lucky that…’ smiled Stamina’s English helmsman.
However, as Jean-Philippe Cau, UNCL President and captain of the French delegation on Stamina, said, the boat was extremely impressive power-reaching. ‘I have never before been on an IRC boat capable of such acceleration,’ said Jean-Philippe, after a fast round the island race in which Staminafinished second to Teasing Machine. ‘Too fast reaching,’ joked Andrew. ‘Great fun rolling over the bigger boats, but maybe 3-4kt faster really is a little too fast… That probably has to be paid for somewhere! What a great configuration for the Caribbean, though – someone should put on a real bowsprit and rent her for the Caribbean 600.’ Stamina, which finished the event more strongly as the wind increased, is the younger sister of Teasing Machine… also known as France’s ‘Reaching Machine’. The difference is that IRC competition in the 36-40ft range is predominantly made up of conventional (ie heavier) displacement designs, while more of Teasing Machine’s rivals in the bigger 43-45ft range are similarly lighter, faster yachts. ‘Also,’ adds Bernard Nivelt, ‘the bigger the boat, the more that
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