Six five ohs and two 470s gathered to sail the 5th training session down in Britany. The weather forecast was not too good with a major storm over England getting down to the south of Britany where we were having our winter training sessions. It was cold and rainy too... THIS IS WINTER... We welcomed back Pierre Soulier and his crew Francois Cornu sailing their recently bought Rondar 8693, which they were sailing for the first time. This boat was prepared by Ian Pinnell for Gilles Carvallo.
Saturday was tough with winds from 15 knots to 35 knots... survival conditions and staying upright was challenging. Only the two 470s were having a lot of fun at full speed...However, in these very tough conditions we were able to tune boats to improve pointing ability under extreme planing conditions upwind.... fun and exhausting... No kite out today...!!!
Sunday was more like sailing, North West 4 decreasing to 3 in the afternoon. All the six fiveohs were able to sail and practise. Speed tests, manoeuvering and races were performed along the afternoon. It was much fun since the group was divided into two subgroups, which were pretty close. Races were tight with three different winners each time. Great fun overall with some interesting results. 8635 (formerly Simon Lake's boat)is damned fast upwind now. Pierre is slow upwind and needs to work on tuning to catch up the speed gap but is real fast downwind. Jean-Claude and Henri are getting closer and closer.
On Saturday evening we could replay the final LVC cup races and comment among ourselves the tactics used by either Aamericans and Italians with Yves Pajot comments (former 5o5 world champion)- very instructive. Overall a great week end.... a lot of fun. We are all looking forward Springtime though...
Cheers
Jean-Baptiste