Tour de France à la Voile Nouvelle-Caledonie wins

by Fabienne Morin on 25 Jul 2010 Tour de France à la Voile 2010 - The two last races of the Tour de France à la Voile which ended today in La Seyne sur Mer did bring some changes to the overall ranking, but not to the top three. After yesterday’s cancellation nothing but a miracle could have prevent Bertrand Pace, skipper of Nouvelle Caledonie from winning a seventh title.

Nouvelle Caledonie makes a beautiful winner. Bertrand Pacé even adds some maestria to his domination, winning the very last inshore race of the Tour.

The former match race world champion had his grasp on the first place before the fleet left the English Channel. And since the fleet sails in the med in never let his major opponent sailing alone.

Well, Courrier Dunkerque skipped by Daniel Souben, succeed at least to escape the tight control today and won the first race of the day.

So the winners of the day both won a race to end one month race around France. Needless to say they were a little bit over the top. The boat ranking third is TPM Coych from the city of Hyeres which is very close to the arrival of the tour.

Even though the Fabien Henry crew were really brilliant in the Med, they didn’t succeed to overlap their handicap with the two leaders.

Now, today was a good day for the two English speaking teams of the race. First for the American boat Groovederci who sailed two steady races and secure it’s fourth place. 'It was really fun today, we love this kind of wind ' explained Deneen Demourkas back in La Seyne harbour. Admiting she was a little bit disappointed not to be in the final top three, she said she regrets the lack of winds of this Tour de France. 'Maybe our boat wich is the newest of the fleet is too rigid and surely our carbon mainsail is. With less than seven knots of wind we had some difficulties taking good start but when the wind is over eleven knots, we just fly !. I would have loved to do better but being fourth is not a bad result'.

The same philosophy was expressed by Rod Greenhalgh, the skipper of Oman Sail’s Renaissance 'Being in the five best boats is quite an achievement, assuming we are only three pros onboard and we made no rotation'. Oman Sail’s Renaissance was very impressive in the spring, winning the Normandy sailing week.

But the Tour de France is something very special. Because of the mix between the short inshore races and the long offshore legs. And because it last one month : 'the level was quite high and we were not at ease with the light winds but we will go for the top three next year. Our omani crew will have one more year training and we can improve some things'said Rob Greenhalgh. Oman Sail’s Renaissance was sixth this morning and finished five because of a poor result for Ile de France 2010.

Other changes occurs in the amateur ranking. The dutch boat Mummaduck was just one point ahead the swiss Ville de Geneve this morning. By the end of the day, Mummaduck was third among the ams. So they were feeling a little bit miserable but they shoudn’t forget that they did a great tour, winning three races and finshing eleventh overall.

The mood was better onboard Purflo Les Thermes Marins Saint Malo who did second on the first race of the day and finished first in the amateur ranking. The swiss team onboard Ville de Geneve had to wait for the jury later on to know their final ranking : 10th overall and second in he amateur section. Not bad but they would have won if they hadn’t been penalised by the jury for a change of spinnaker.

Things were easier in the student class for even if they had a rather bad day on the water, starting late and sailing on the wrong side of the race, the Team SOG Safran boat stay first. They even keep their ranking : eighth just in front the first amateur boat..

So here is the end of the 33rd Tour de France à la Voile, the last one to have been sailed with the Farr 30. The new M34 built by Archambault is the one design selected for the 2011 edition.

From what we saw yesterday and today in the breeze, we may already say that the next tour will be even faster !

Overall results :

1 Nouvelle Calédonie (Bertrand Pacé / Vincent Portugal) 129 pts
2 Courrier Dunkerque (Daniel Souben) 160 pts
3 Toulon Provence Méditerranée - COYCH (Fabien Henry) 192 pts
4 Groovederci (Deneen Demourkas) 222 pts
5 Oman Sail's Renaissance (Rob Greenhalgh) 245 pts
6 Ile de France (Jimmy Pahun / Vincent Aillaud) 251 pts
7 Manche Basse Normandie (Benoit Charon) 308 pts
8 Team SOG - SAFRAN (Julien Villon / Quentin Ponroy) 364 pts
9 Purflo Les Thermes Marins - St Malo (François Lebourdais / Pierre Hingant / Quentin Grueau) 368 pts
10 Ville de Genève - Carrefour Prévention (Jérôme Clerc / Bruno Barbarin) 369 pts
11 Mummaduck (Laurent Pagès) 376 pts
12 CSC - HEC - Ecole Navale (Hervé Gautier) 412 pts
13 Normale Sup Lagardère (Eric Brezellec) 424 pts
14 Côtes d'Armor (Stéphane Letertre) 489 pts
15 TU Delft (Bert Schandevyl) 500 pts
16 Ville du Port - Région Réunion (Thomas Terte / Thomas Pasquier / Noé Delpech) 501 pts
17 Brest Grandes Ecoles - ENSIETA - ESCB - ISEN (Tangi Mahé) 528 pts
18 BRUNEL (Peter Jan Postma / Bart Verwerft) 568 pts
19 Nantes - Saint Nazaire (Jean Queveau) 580 pts
20 INSA SOPRA TSP TEM (Thomas Rahier / Nicolas Andrieu) 588 pts
21 Bred (Eric Drouglazet / Christophe Bouvet) 609 pts
22 Port de plaisance de Roscoff - CCI de Morlaix (Julien Berthélémé / François Liron) 633 pts
23 Bienne Voile - SRS II (Lorenz Muller) 655 pts
24 ESSEC – Hanploi (Damien Seguin) 680 pts
25 Bienne Voile - SRS I (Stefan Seger) 735 pts
26 Région de Bruxelles Capitale Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest (Cyril Michel / Laurent Declercq) 821 pts
27 Arts et Métiers - Centrale Paris Défi SEP (Clément Hochart) 833 pts
28 SUPELEC (François Isopet / Pierre Joly) 989 pts