First Figaro race

New boats kick off in Tour de Bretagne. We speak to Sam Davies.

Pos	Boat	Skipper	Point
1	THALES	TABARLY Erwan	1,00
2	CAMUS IMMOBILIER	GUERIN Ronan	2,00
3	DEFI SANTE VOILE	PETIT Benoit	3,00
4	DELTA DORE	BEYOU Jeremie	4,00
5	GENERALI ASSURANCES	ELIES Yann	5,00
6	BOSTIK FINDLEY	CAUDRELIER BENAC Charles	6,00
7	PETIT NAVIRE,LE BON GOUT DU LARGE	CHABAGNY Thierry	7,00
8	BERMUDES	THIERCELIN Marc	8,00
9	D'AUCY	JOURDREN Bruno	9,00
10	DAVID OLIVIER	DROUGLAZET Eric	10,00
11	CERCLE VERT	MORVAN Gildas	11,00
12	ING REAL ESTATE	BAKKER Sander	12,00
13	CREPES WHAOU!	ESCOFFIER Franck Yves	13,00
14	TETRAKTYS	DESMARETS Pascal	14,00
15	SOLETANCHE BACHY	GRIMONT Damien	15,00
16	CREALINE	LE CLEAC'H Armel	16,00
17	CREDIT MUTUEL VILLE DE CHERBOURG	TOULORGE Alexandre	17,00
18	SKIPPER AG2R	GREGOIRE Jeanne	18,00
19	PORT TREBEURDEN	ATTANASIO Romain	19,00
20	REVE DE GRAND - ACTUAL INTERIM	LE BLEVEC Yves	20,00
21	SKANDIA	DAVIES Sam	21,00
22	ESPOIR CREDIT AGRICOLE	RIOU Gwenael	22,00
23	FUTUR	BOS Christian	23,00
24	UNILOG	BOUGARD Patrice	24,00
25	SOR TMC	BOUVET Christophe	25,00
26	CYP	LEBRETON Eric	26,00

The first leg of the Figaro class' two handed Tour de Bretagne à la Voile got off to a fast start today from St Malo in northern France - the first ever race in the class' new Marc Lombard one design.

Among the 26 strong fleet was Sam Davies, sailing Skandia with fellow Royal & SunAlliance partner Emma Westmacott.

"We had an apprehensive start," Sam told The Daily Sail. "New boat, first time in 2003 helming a little boat. It was a hard start line, because it was a port tack fetch/spinnaker reach start - was the most dangerous way of starting the race. - and someone had parked a massive cruise ship over night right over the middle of the start line which didn’t help. They obviously didn't know the Tour de Bretagne was starting!"

There was one general recall, before the race got underway at 12:24 local time.
Crêpes Whaou! sailed by Route du Rhum multihull sailor Franck-Yves Escoffier and Yannick Simon made the best start, followed by Charles Caudrelier-Bénac and former Figaro winner Pascal Bidegorry on board Bostik Findley and Delta Dore skippered by Jérémie Beyou and meteorolist Gilles Chiorri.

In the 12-18 knot southwesterly winds, Davies and Westmacott chose not to hoist their kite. "We felt it would lose more in distance hoisting and dropping because we were so new to the boat," continued Sam. "So we chose to sail with just the genoa, but there some quite cool hoists and drops going on – and some really bad ones! In retrospect we should have had the spinnaker up, because I think we would have been fine hoisting and dropping and we would have been a bit further ahead after the first mark."

The fleet passed Cap Fréhel at 13h43 with Crêpes Whaou! in the lead, followed by Delta Dore, Bostik Findley, Camus Immobilier and Thales, sailed by Eric Tabarly's nephew Erwan and Figaro and Mini Transat veteran Philippe Vicariot. His late uncle's famous Whitbread maxi Pen Duick VI (which Tabarly senior sailed singlehanded in the 1976 OSTAR) was today following the race.

One hour later, Bostik Findley was leading the fleet followed by Delta Dore and Crêpes Whaou!, Thales, Groupe Generali Assurances and Figaro veteran Bruno Jourdren and Jean-Marie Darius on D’Aucy in sixth position. Jourdren won this leg of the race two years ago.

"After Cape Frehel we had a beat where we got a good shift but then we got greedy and thought it was going to shift more, but then it went back," continued Sam.

Usually on Figaro races around Brittany, success comes from being exceptionally brave/stupid rockhopping to avoid the tide. There was none of this on this first leg, although this is likely during the forthcoming legs. "You are quite restricted to go close to the marks in case they change the course. So you have to keep an eye on the marks, and they are positioned so there was not much ducking in about out of rocks to be done on this leg," said Sam.



Eventually it was Tabarly and Vicoriot (above) on Thales who were first to arrive at the finish of Saint Quay/Portrieux. There was a particularly fine come backmade by the Dutch Mini sailor Sander Bakker and Marten Jan Ringers on ING Real Estate, who moved from last to 12th place by the time they crossed the finishing line.

For Davies, this is the first occasion that she, like most of her competitors had a chance to sail their boat in anger. "It is good," Davies commented on her new steed. "I think it is going to be okay on your own. It is quite tweaky. We were tweaking it around a lot especially upwind. At some points we found ourselves dog slow and then we’d change a couple of things and we’d shoot off again, so small changes seem to make quite big differences today for us. We were just playing it the whole time trying to keep the boat fast and making quite a lot of progress."

At present there doesn't seem to be much speed difference between the boats, although some of the competitors have had more of an opportunity to sail the class' prototypes that were launched last September. "I think their boat handling and knowing when to put sails up, they are probably a bit ahead," said Sam. "In terms of people on their own boats, I think no one has had much more than a couple of weeks."

At the time of our conversation Davies and Westmacott were off in search of food before attending the obligatory prize giving. "You don’t have time to eat on these races. You are just trimming and helming all the time...."

Tomorrow they set sail for Perros-Guerrec, 40 miles away.