2004 French Nationals and Open Championship

Lac de Madine 21-23 May
source: by Jon Fish

OK Coupe de France – Lac de Madine

5 British boats travelled out to Lac de Madine in France to be greeted by 43 continental boats for the French Champs. Sailed on a large inland lake, the venue offered a variety of wind conditions and lots of sun!

Day 1 saw Bart Bomans (current European champion) dominate the fleet with 3 bullets. In the very light wind racing, Nick Craig (GBR) put in 3 second places, despite chasing women around the course whilst never quite managing to match Bomans speed. Slightly further down, Will Turner was lying in 4th overnight with a 3,7,13 score-line. The newly suntanned fleet returned to shore at 8pm to be greeted with free beer, and an enticing BBQ.

Day 2:
Sailors awoke on Friday to be greeted by sunshine and a nice force 3. After the obligatory croissant the fleet set sail for the day’s four races, which saw a reversal of fortunes for many competitors in the breezier conditions. Two more brits stormed up the rankings, with Terry Curtis putting in an excellent 4,6,2,4 sequence leaving him 4th overall, and Jon Fish sailing consistently quickly to score 2 thirds and a sixth to lie 5th overall.
Bomans again dominated the fleet, although Craig just beat him in race 7. Turner received the comedy capsize award for diving over his transom while lying in 2nd position (a vain attempt to clear some weed) and 5th Brit Julian Burhnam got a piece of the action with a couple of high placings.
Everybody was extremely well catered for during the evening’s steak supper, before the Brits held court in a sing-along, with a couple of ‘interesting’ numbers (they did say we could lower the tone!!!)

Day 3:
The competitors saw off their hangovers through 3 races in a shifty force 4. Gear failure for Bomans in race 9 meant that Craig could still have taken the title, but he opted to save any match racing tactics to a different stage. Bomans just pipped Craig in the final race, taking the title with it. Despite beating him in the last 5 races, Curtis just failed to take 3rd overall from Rüdiger Prinz (GER).

As well as thanks for the great hospitality from the French hosts, praise has to be given to the race officer for getting 10 top races in. It isn’t often that the windward mark is moved to the right place for every beat!