The French crew broke the speed record at the SailGP

Emmanuel Langler, Media 365: Posted on Sunday 11 September 2022 at 11:55 am.

During the first day of the French SailGP stage, the French team did well on Saturday in Saint-Tropez.

After the first three regattas of the SailGP, featuring nine ultra-fast flying boats, which were contested on Saturday in Saint-Tropez, the French team finished fourth in the event. The formation led by Quentin Delapierre scored 19 points halfway, having secured 9 points thanks to second place in the last race of the day. The French crew, who finished second in Copenhagen three weeks ago, stayed in the game to win the timpani tour, but above all made an impression by winning a record.

The French national team flashed at a speed of 99.94 km / h!

He simply set the best speed in Sail GP history. While the winds were blowing between 20 and 30 knots, the blues were recorded at 53.96 knots, or 99.94 km/h! And so Quentin Delabier’s crew erased 98.26 km/h of boards created by the British crew led by Ben Inslee, Olympic quad sailing champion. Note that the absolute cruising speed record (more than 500 metres) has been set since 2012 by Australian Paul Larsen, in the multi-hull Vestas Sailrocket 2, at a speed of 121.06 km/h (65.45 knots).

“I don’t quite believe it,” Quentin Delabier said. It was 30 knots at times, and we often sailed above 50 knots. Once again, SailGP is pushing the limits of international sailing. I wanted to reach a speed of 100 km / h. You can feel a lot of things from 95 km / h, and the boat begins to vibrate, this is called cavitation. Then the foil begins to go down very slowly, if we quickly touch the water a little, we turn around. It trembles so much that we are afraid that the boat will break. Delapier was present at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics in the Nakra boat with Manon Udinet, who was also on board on Saturday as a strategist. In the general classification, New Zealanders are ahead of Peter Burning with 27 points over the United States Jimmy Sethel (25 points) and Australia over Tom Slingsby (20 points). The last three races and the final race are scheduled for Sunday.