New sponsor for Multi Cup 60'

Coffee sponsor supports new circuit

Multi Cup 60’, the new format of the 60ft multihulls ORMA championship has a new title sponsor in Ambassador Premium Coffee. The involvement of the new sponsor in the Multi Cup 60’ championship is confirmed for the whole of 2006, with the prospects of continuing this sponsorship until 2009 under consideration.

Nicolas Tamari, General Manager of Ambassador Premium Coffee has commented on the agreement: "This is a great extension to our sporting sponsorship portfolio. We¹ve already been heavily involved in tennis and ice skating (which has a high profile in France) because of the disciplinary and technical values and sponsoring sailing really adds to that group, especially with its spirit of adventure, its respect for the environment and the team building element. We got really seduced by the multihull scene and we soon became determined to support its developments."

Gitana team's Baron de Rothschild added: "this title sponsorship gives us perfect continuity with what we are trying to do with this exceptional class of boat. What’s more, I’m continuing to support the Class, and other companies are able to have their logos on the sails of the boats taking part in the Multi Cup grands prix."

Denis Horeau, Race Director of the Multi Cup SAS added his views: "The arrival of Cafe Ambassador as title sponsor is excellent news! The company is already well known in the sporting world in France with its other sponsorships. It seems to me that its a perfect fit with them as their values are so similar. We are really proud to be carrying their logo on the sails of these amazing boats for the first race of the season."

The Race

Monday, 8 May may be a bank-holiday in France, but the six French sailing teams coming to London for the race will not be relaxing! At 1100 the boats will lock out of Canary Wharf and then will carry out a parade of sail up the Thames to Tower Bridge, before coming back down the Thames through the Thames Barrier to Cross Ness where the start is intended to be at 1300 (we have this direct from Denis Horeau). However Horeau also tells us that this is on the basis that the end is not from the east. If it is - and according to Horeau this is indeed the forecast, then the start will have to be further out down the Thames Estuary.

Five of the teams raced against each other during training sessions organised by the Port La Forêt Training Centre last week, and once again Franck Cammas' Groupama 2 appeared to be the fastest, even though Banque Populaire was being sailed quite aggressively. As for Gitana 11 and Géant, they were still tuning up. Frédéric Le Peutrec launched his trimaran just one week ago and Michel Desjoyeaux was waiting still for his new daggerboard while Sopra Group, now skippered by Antoine Koch was getting the hang of close, inshore racing in his new steed.

Crew line-up:

Banque Populaire
Pascal Bidégorry (skipper), Ronan Lucas, Florent Chastel, Ewen Le Clech, Charles Caudrelier, Yvan Ravussin

Géant
Michel Desjoyeaux (skipper), Thierry Briend, Emmanuel Le Borgne, Jean-Christophe Mourniac, Romain Attanasio, Jean-Baptiste Epron

Gitana 11
Frédéric Le Peutrec (skipper), Baron Benjamin de Rothschild , Frédéric Guilmin, Daniel Souben , Ronan Le Goff , François Denis

Gitana 12
Thierry Duprey du Vorsent (skipper), Erwan Le Roux, Mayeul Riffet, Alexandre Marmorat, Nicolas Raynaud, Léopold Lucet

Groupama-2
Franck Cammas (skipper), Franck Proffit , Bruno Laurent , Jean-Baptiste Levaillant , Lionel Lemonchois, Jacques Caraës

Sopra Group
Antoine Koch (skipper), Grégory Gendron, Jean-Baptiste Daramy, François Gabart, TBC x 2