Seychelles Regatta - 272 Sailsbag win third race |01 June 2018

● C’est La Vie overall leaders

With an all-female crew and skippered by Justine Mettraux, 727 Sailsbag won the third race of the Seychelles Regatta on Wednesday.

The race started in the morning in the bay of Anse Possession to Curieuse Island.

In Seychelles for the first time, 727 Sailsbag skipper Mettraux said the win was very encouraging as they had problems to adjust to the right race alignment in the previous two races.

“Today (Wednesday) we made the right choice and the ladies coordinated and maneuvered well and we are all very happy,” skipper Mettraux told Sports NATION.

She added that they will try to win other races even though the boats have advantages over one another depending on the speed of the wind. 

Skippered by Anthony Marchand, C’est La Vie (Eden Island) came out third in the race to maintain first position on the ranking table.

“The competition looks a bit tight and it gets physical with a lot of maneuvering as the boats are different with some being more rapid in some conditions and others less rapid in other conditions and we encountered a lot of difficulty in this race, but it was just fantastic to go round this magnificent island,” said C’est La Vie skipper Marchand, who added that he and his crew are really enjoying the races.

Second in the race on Wednesday was Julbo, skippered by Alexis Loison.

The weather was far better than during the first two days of competition with favourable winds and sunny intervals and because of the short distant, the race was diverted towards Saint Pierre Island where the boats had to make a U-turn and race downwards on a tour around Curieuse island to finish in its bay.

It was ISPC/Mouton Cadet/Mason’s Travel who, like in the past two races, led early on and they were followed metres behind by C’est la vie (Eden Island). But this time ISPC/Mouton Cadet/Mason’s Travels could not keep their lead as they committed an error when they had to make the U-turn way outside the course zone and they were penalised and had to settle for fifth position even though they crossed the finish line first.

At the start of the race, STB (Seychelles Island), skippered by François Gabart, trailed behind the group and they managed to put things together to cross the finish line in fourth position.

Yama, skippered by two-time champion Michel Desjoyeaux, crossed the line in sixth position followed in seventh place by Driget, skippered by Roland Jourdain. And last in the race was the French-American team Los Angeles Lumière, skippered by Romain Attanasio.

Second behind C’est La Vie in the overall ranking are ISPC/Mouton Cadet/Mason’s Travel. In third position are 272 Sailsbag, fourth Los Angeles Lumière, fifth Julbo, sixth Yema, seventh Driget and eighth STB (Seychelles Island).

In yesterday’s fourth race, the boats had to sail from Curieuse to Frégate Island and the results were not known by the time of going to press. Today’s fifth race will be from Frégate to La Digue.

P. J.