In This Issue
• Figaro: Guillaume Pirouelle setting Stage 1 pace
• Who's Going To Win The Solitaire Du Figaro Paprec?
• All calm on the surface - Sevenstar Yacht Services
• Greek team on Melx III win 5.5 Metre German Opens
• Seahorse Sailor Of The Month
• Bournemouth Digital Poole Week
• Arkas Aegean Link Regatta
• Plymouth Fastnet 500
• Jake Julien Clinches M32 North American Championship Title
• Featured Charter: Kallima - Swan 82
• Featured Brokerage:
• • Cape 31 - #30
• • Ichi Ban 60
• • Farr 40 OD Warpath
• The Last Word: Terence McKenna

Brought to you by Seahorse magazine and YachtScoring.com EuroSail News is a digest of sailing news and opinions, regatta results, new boat and gear information and letters from sailors -- with a European emphasis. Contributions welcome, send to

Guillaume Pirouelle setting Stage 1 pace. Ireland's Dolan in the match
After a relatively quick, express sprint across the Channel from Sunday's start off Caen to pass the Isle of Wight early this morning, the leaders of the first stage of the 54th La Solitaire du Figaro Paprec are finding their return path - heading to a turning mark west off Paimpol peninsula- increasingly challenging.

On the second afternoon of the 610 nautical miles first course from Caen to Kinsale, their northerly breeze has been steadily fading, dropping from the welcome 12-15 knots of this morning. The adverse tidal currentat the Channel Islands will hamper them, and the Casquets exclusion zone blocks their direct path to the next turning mark just off Paimpol. So far the course has run in their favour but the second night looks complicated.

Le Havrais Guillaume Pirouelle (Region Normandie), 26, may have made a slightly inauspicious start Sunday lunchtime in what might still beconsidered 'home waters' - he got his timing to the line wrong - but he quickly made amends and has led the 32 strong fleet since around 1700hrs Sunday evening, emerging from the Normandy beaches with a steady lead of 1.2 miles which he has held through the day, pursued by the hugely talented 21 year old Basil Bourgnon (Edenred)

Ireland's Tom Dolan (Smurfit Kappa-Kingspan) has been consistently in the lead group, from fourth at Nab Tower, fourth at the Intermediate Sprint passage at the Needles Fairway where he missed by seconds a one minute bonus to be taken off the elapsed time of the third positioned skipper. Leader Pirouelle collected a five minute bounty.

Needles Fairway Intermediate Sprint points:
1. Guillaume Pirouelle (Region Normandie) at 09h38 (bonus 5 minutes) 2. Alexis Loison (Groupe Reel) :at 09h55 (bonus 3 minutes) 3. Corentin Horeau (Banque Populaire) :at 09h59 (bonus 1minute) 4. Tom Dolan (Smurfit Kappa-Kingspan) :at 09h59 5. Basile Bourgnon (Endenred) : at 09h59

Race Tracker

lasolitaire.com

Who's Going To Win The Solitaire Du Figaro Paprec?
On Sunday, 32 sailors, including 10 newcomers, 6 sailors from outside of France and 5 women, lined up at the start of the 54th edition of the Solitaire du Figaro Paprec in Caen. As before each major race, to judge the quality of those taking part, Tip & Shaft questioned a group of experts, including the two most recent winners, Tom Laperche (2022) and Pierre Quiroga (2021), the Spaniard, Pep Costa, who competed in the last two races and remains very close to the circuit, Jeanne Gregoire, head of the Finistère ocean racing training centre in Port-la-Forêt, Julien Pulve, former coach at the La Rochelle training centre and Yann Chateau, the Race Director of the Solitaire.

Our experts had a tough job on their hands choosing the three top skippers, with the podium places likely to be fought out between Alexis Loison, Corentin Horeau and Guillaume Pirouelle, the first behind the two others with a very small margin.

When he crosses the start line on Sunday, Alexis Loison, 39 years of age, (Groupe Reel), will be taking part in his 17th Solitaire. "An experienced sailor, who has passed a lot on to Guillaume Pirouelle, with whom he sailed double-handed in 2021," explained Julien Pulve, another former Solitaire racer. His strong points? "Alexis is very strong when sailing in currents," stressed Yann Chateau, which was confirmed by Tom Laperche: "He is the ruler in this area. That's a key point with currents often creating huge gaps between Figaro racers in the English Channel. Alexis is also a brilliant strategist. When he goes for tactical plays, he often succeeds."

Read more in Tip & Shaft

All calm on the surface - Sevenstar Yacht Services
For racing teams with global ambitions, Sevenstar helps to maximise the number of regattas they attend in different parts of the world

Examining what happens behind the scenes at Sevenstar's Racing Yachts' logistics division reveals the huge amount of work, knowledge and experience needed to reliably and safely ship raceboats of all types around the world. This is the domain of engineering and operations manager Max Stepanov, who is an operation colleague of Sander Speet, and whose skilled and experienced team includes marine engineers and naval architects. Many have worked in varied roles at Sevenstar , often starting on ships before transitioning to working ashore.

Before joining in 2016, Stepanov was a merchant navy officer for 20 years, including five as captain. His deputy, Sean Lines, is ex-Royal Navy and a former Sevenstar loadmaster - a role requiring a high level of qualification and in-house training. Marian Minoiu, an engineering project manager, is a naval architect and marine engineer with 25 years' experience and deep understanding of all intricacies of cargo handling. Another engineering project manager, Rene Berger spent two decades as a deck and engineering officer and 15 as master mariner. He has degrees in marine operations and engineering.

Full article in the September issue of Seahorse

Greek team on Melx III win 5.5 Metre German Open, Ali Baba are German champions
Melx III (GRE 5, Stavros Papagiannopoulos, Yannis Mitakis, Pavlos Kagialis) has won the 2023 5.5 Metre German Open at Tutzing on Starnberger See, hosted by the Deutscher Touring Yacht-Club. Ali Baba (GER 125, Wolf-Eberhard Richter, Beata Kallkowski, Bernd Selig) took second and became German Champions, while No Stress (SUI 201, Jorg Sonntag, Olaf Schulz, Jacob Rek) was third.

Sunday was a bleak day on the lake in contrast to the previous two days, with low cloud, incessant rain and low temperatures. After a brief postponement the fleet of 15 boats was sent out for a 12.00 start. Only one race was sailed to complete the series and it was down to Melx III and Ali Baba to take the overall win.

Racing continues in Tutzing for the Enoshima Trophy for boats still conforming to the rules in place at the time the 5.5 Metre was an Olympic class.

The World Championship runs from 24-29 September in Porto Cervo, with 34 entries so far. -- Robert Deaves

Final results after 7 races:
1. Melx III (GRE 5, Stavros Papagiannopoulos, Yannis Mitakis, Pavlos Kagialis) 8
2. Ali Baba (GER 125, Wolf-Eberhard Richter, Beata Kallkowski, Bernd Selig) 11
3. No Stress (SUI 201, Jörg Sonntag, Olaf Schulz, Jacob Rek) 20
4. Manuela V, (ITA 36, Guido Tommasi, Marco Anessi, Edoardo Gamba) 33
5. Striezi (GER 107, Johannes Schmederer, Florian Lautenschläger, Gunter Ernst) 45

Full results

5.5class.org

Seahorse Sailor Of The Month
This month's nominees:

Betsy Alison (USA)
College All American, 5-time Rolex Sailor of the Year, US Sailing Hall of Fame 2011, multiple world champion in keelboats and match racing, 25 years as US Paralympic coach. Then in early 2022 doctors found a large tumour on her hip; after 18 months of treatment and accepting it was not the time to return to a performance dinghy, Alison jumped in a Hansas 303 Paralympic keelboat for the 2023 World Championship in Holland. And you probably know how that worked out…

Diego Botin (ESP)
After a disappointing start to the Spanish SailGP campaign an enforced crew shuffle saw the Spanish 49er sailor and avid surfer take over the helm at the end of last year. After several months of steadily improving results the popular Spanish sailor led his equally young F50 team to an impressive victory in tricky, shifty conditions in Los Angeles in July. In second in LA was Denmark’s Nicolai Sehested and, finding himself in very unfamiliar territory Tom Slingsby was 3rd

Last Month's winner:
Travis Greenberg (USA)
‘What an impressive athlete. His depth and breadth of skills only matched by his humility and easy-going nature. Not a future star. A star already’ - Mark Heeley; ‘He mixes it with the young and old on boats. True talent with a curious mind’ - Russ Silvestri; ‘I’ve sailed with Travis and his tactical ability and quick thinking are out of this world’ - Phi Berner; ‘I sailed against Travis at the Optimist Worlds this year. I’m afraid he is an amazing sailor!!!’ - Walter Heeley..

View past winners of Sailor of the Month

Seahorse Sailor of the Month is sponsored by Harken Derm, Musto and Dubarry. Who needs silverware, our prizes are usable!

Cast your vote, submit comments, even suggest a candidate for next month at seahorsemagazine.com/sailor-of-the-month/vote-for-sailor-of-the-month

Bournemouth Digital Poole Week
After racing was cancelled on Thursday because of no wind, Poole Week came to a riotous close on Friday. Plenty of breeze, together with sun and some good harbour waves, gave everyone a memorable day's sailing. The wind was consistently in the high 'teens, gusting to 24 knots, which tested the hiking muscles and resulted in some blistering downwind legs.

For some it was a little too much and a few boats stayed ashore. Plenty capsized but carried on to enjoy a sparkling day on - or occasionally in - the water.

Sadly in the case of Bob Alexander and Huw Willetts, who are always among the front-runners in the Flying Fifteens, a broken shroud meant they couldn't start the racing having got all the way to the Top Triangle. Richard Whitworth also had teething troubles with his new boat despite having scored three successive bullets, and was uncharacteristically buried in the fleet for both Friday's races. How things might have panned out had he been firing on all cylinders no one will know, but it had been tight at the top anyway. Jon Gorringe and Kelly Aaron entered the final day snapping at Whitworth's heels, with results that included a first and three seconds. A close 2nd in the first race on Friday and a 1st in the second was enough to give them overall victory over Whitworth by a single point. As Steve Tyler - Parkstone Yacht Club's sailing secretary - said at the prize-giving, here was a Merlin Rocket sailor (of some standing) having a go in a Flying Fifteen with his partner and winning Poole Week. In a seriously competitive fleet that includes sailors who have won the odd world championship and Olympic medal, that's not bad going.

Another fleet to see the results change on the final day was the RS200s. With only one point between Peter Loretto and Dave and Jan Pointer, it was all down to who made the fewest mistakes and spent the most time with their mast pointing skywards. That turned out to be the Pointers, who won both races to finish the week three points ahead.

The race management by Bob Jennings on the Parkstone Platform and Fi Linford on the committee boat - with the assistance of their well-drilled teams - made everything as slick on the water as it could possibly be. -- David Harding

Provisional results on .pooleweek.org

Arkas Aegean Link Regatta
Arkas Aegean Link Regatta was held for the seventh time along the shores of Cesme. The winner of the regatta has been Borusan Çılgın Sigma, followed by Blue Moon in the second place and Anything Dere Construction in the third place. The champion of the Turkish Yacht League that took place for the first time this year and had Arkas Aegean Link Regatta as its final leg of the races, remained the same. The champion of the Turkish Yacht League became Borusan Çılgın Sigma, followed by Blue Moon in the second place and Bey Metal Team Linea Rossa in the third place.

Held in Cesme, on one of the best courses in the world for sailing and yacht racing in terms of the wind, the Arkas Aegean Link Regatta was also the final leg of the Turkish Yacht League, organized by the Turkish Sailing Federation. With the addition of J70 class races for the first time this year, the shores of Cesme became the center of a unique excitement.

Champions of the First Yacht League Are Announced

Following the MDK "Cabotage" Cup, the 52nd Naval Forces Cup, the Coast Guard Cup, and the Halicarnassus 100th Year Cup, the Arkas Aegean Link Regatta has been the fifth and final leg of the Turkish Yacht League, organized for the first time this year in order to raise interest in the world of sailing and extend this sport to a wider range, just like in other sports. While Borusan Çılgın Sigma has become the champion of the league, Blue Moon secured the second place, followed by Beymetal Team Linea Rossa in the third place.

arkasaegeanlinkregatta.com

Plymouth Fastnet 500
Steve Andrew; ‘Sunfire’ entering Plymouth Sound National Marine Park. Photo by Jerry Lock, fotocraft.net. Click on image to enlarge.

1200hrs, Sunday 13th August saw the start of the Plymouth Fastnet Race. A South- south westerly 14-16 knot wind greeted them as they made their way out of the western entrance of Plymouth Sound towards the Eddystone Lighthouse. The sea state and winds were to increase overnight as the fleet made their way to the west.

Overnight there were a number of key updates after what was a very challenging period at Lands' End. #superbigou reported issues with their canting keel following a bang As they came off a wave, which brought their race to an end.

Thursday saw the closest finish yet in the '500 race, with just under 1 hour 8 minutes separating both boats on the water. Both enjoyed a fresh Easterly breeze as they traversed the sound and entered the Cattewater to finally finish an epic second edition of the Plymouth Fastnet 500. Videos of both finishes are now available on the Facebook page.

During which time Nova was battling to find some consistent breeze due south of Penzance. With light and shifty winds overnight, Nova was making slow progress East towards the finish, often under 2 knots SOG. But if we know anything about this crew, they are resilient! This morning however paints a very different picture as they enjoy a building southerly breeze and are averaging 4 knots in the right direction! Currently around 18-20knots, the breeze is only going to build and free their angle to make their final stretch into the finish line off the RWYC clubhouse the most enjoyable it could be.

It has been without question a herculean effort for this crew, with very little around them to gauge their performance, they have managed to sail a strong course and have kept fighting when others have fallen by the wayside.

After what was a testing sail up the southwest coast all the way from Lands' End with variable wind conditions, the 4-crew onboard Nova were in very good spirits as they reached across the sound and into the Cattewater to claim 3rd place overall in the '500 race.

With that we bring 2023 to a close and look forward to next year, when we will be running the 3rd edition of the '500 in once again in August.

Results
1. Steve Andrews - Sunfire
2. Daniel Flannagan - Manu
3. Sean Koehler - Nova

rwyc.org/plymouth-fastnet-500-race/

Jake Julien Clinches M32 North American Championship Title
In a heart-pounding who-beats-who final race, Jake Julien and his formidable Rated X team were crowned champions of both the M32 North American Championship and the M32 Midtown Cup series.

The culmination of an entire season's efforts condensed into one electrifying Sunday race, where everything hung in the balance for both Rated X and defending champion Convexity, helmed by Don Wilson.

This weekend, the racecourse was fully automated for the very first time, with the help of Vakaros and MarkSetBot. No more race committee boat on the starting line - Motorized MarkSetBots replaced all traditional course marks. Cutting-edge Vakaros RaceSense technology streamlined the starting sequence, transmitted OCS calls, and provided sailors precise distance-to-line data, eliminating the need for manual pinging. As always, the Class employs professional race organizers & umpires on the water to govern the races. The new race management technology in the sport allows for fair, consistent racing.

Results

m32world.com

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See listing details in Seahorse Charters

Contact
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See the the Seahorse charter collection

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2004 Farr 40 OD Warpath. 74000 ex VAT EuR.

Well proven racer, with very good results in ORCi and SRS.

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The Last Word
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