DRHEAM Cup heading for 2022

Start of the race - July 2020 © Thierry Martinez / Drheam Promotion

The DRHEAM Cup / Grand Prix de France de Course au Large is back! The multi-class race, first run in 2016 and organised by Jacques Civilise, will be held next year, from 13 to 23 July 2022.

Cherbourg-en-Cotentin will welcome a first-class fleet like in 2018, with the arrival of the 2nd edition and in 2020, for the start. 12 classes, crewed, double-handed and solo, are invited to take the start on Sunday 17 July. Three brand-new courses, suited to the different speeds of boats, will be held during this great race, to ensure that the fleet arrives in La Trinité-sur-Mer in a narrow time frame, after three to four days at sea.

All the details are now available in the notice of race, published on the official website.

Genesis and DNA

Started in 2016 by Jacques Civilise, the DRHEAM Cup / Grand Prix de France de Course au Large has in little time become an unmissable summer offshore race held every two years. Each year, it attracts more competitors, the competition-sharing-celebration motto that is part of its DNA.

Competition, with the organiser's clear and stated aim for the DRHEAM Cup / Grand Prix de France de Course au Large to become a reference event in the major offshore race category, like the Rolex Fastnet Race, held in odd years, when the DRHEAM-Cup is held in even years.

Sharing, with an OPEN event - hence its name Grand Prix de France de Course au Large, open to all boats, all formats (double- handed and crewed) and all sailors, amateurs, professionals, men and women, with a particular emphasis placed on young people, via the Rêves de Large operation.

Last but not least, celebration, the real DNA of this summer event that its host regions, Cherbourg-en-Cotentin, the Cotentin, Manche and Normandy Region on the one hand and La Trinité-sur-Mer and the Morbihan on the other, are delighted to welcome in a friendly atmosphere that attracts great numbers. This was the case in 2016 and 2018, with tens of thousands of people at the finish of the second edition of Cherbourg-en-Cotentin. In 2020, despite the pandemic, many visitors came to admire the boats at Port Chantereyne.

A fourth qualifying edition for the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe and courses adapted to each of the invited classes

Time now for the fourth edition that, like in 2018, has been selected by the organisation of the Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe, OC SPORT Pen Duick, as a qualification event for the single-handed trans-Atlantic race starting in November 2022. The DRHEAM-CUP will therefore be open to all classes of boats that can enter the single- handed trans-Atlantic race, the Ultimes, Imoca, Ocean Fifty, Class40, Rhum Monohulls and Rhum Multihulls (*). This promises a very high- level race, many single-handed sailors have made the DRHEAM Cup / Grand Prix de France de Course au Large a compulsory event to qualify and/or train for the Route Du Rhum - Destination Guadeloupe.

For classes that do not aim to compete in the solo transatlantic race, the DRHEAM Cup / Grand Prix de France de Course au Large will be open to crewed or double-handed entries, as usual.

True to the spirit of innovation characteristic of the event since its beginnings, Jacques Civilise and his team have designed three brand new courses, 600, 1000 and 1500 nautical miles long. The DC 600 course join the select club of major offshore races such as the Fastnet Race, Sidney- Hobart, the Caribbean 600 and the Middle Sea Race, that are all 600 nautical miles long.

These courses, all lengthened and carefully drawn, are a combination of coastal and offshore sailing that is the salt of these major multi-class events, as well as guaranteeing racing at all points of sail, no matter what the wind direction:

The DC 600 course, 600 nautical miles (Figaro Bénéteau 3, Multi 2000, IRC, Osiris habitables, Rhum Monohulls and Multihulls, Large Open Monohulls, Classic Yachts) will pass the South of England (West Shamble), the Isles of Scilly, Ushant and the Plateau de Rochebonne.

The DC 1000 course, 1000 nautical miles (Ocean Fifty, Imoca, Class 40) will head to the Fastnet after the Isles of Scilly, before heading to Ushant and the BXA buoy (Gironde estuary) and Quiberon Bay.

The DC 1500 course, 1500 nautical miles (Ultimes) that will take the largest boats to the Isle of Man, then the Fastnet, past Ushant, across the Bay of Biscay to Bilbao and a last run to La Trinité-sur-Mer.

The start of the main race, on Sunday 17 July will be preceded on Friday 15 July by a prologue, the DRHEAM-TROPHY, during which the Rêves de Large operation will be held, a tradition since the first edition in 2016: it consists in inviting young people, from the Cotentin area, to take part in the prologue on board participating boats.