Setting out from Cherbourg-en-Cotentin on Monday July 15 at 4:30 pm, the crew of Class40 Groupe Snef, led by Xavier Macaire, has just won the Dhream Cup in its category, crossing the finish line in La Trinité-sur-mer this Friday July 19 at 8:06 pm and 07 seconds, after 4 days 3 hours 36 minutes and 07 seconds of racing.
Before the start, the race management had announced a reduction in the course due to increasingly light weather conditions; thus, instead of the 1000 miles initially planned, the Class40s will have covered 630 miles, abandoning the Fastnet passage.
However, the Dhream Cup 2024 lived up to its reputation as a technical and challenging race. After invigorating conditions in the Cherbourg harbor, offering a fine reaching crossing of the English Channel during which it was necessary to be concentrated and constantly at the helm, the fleet sailed upwind along the English coast.
Constantly battling for first place with Swift, second when passing Wolf Rock and the Drheam Cup mark, Team Snef definitively took first place from July 18 onwards, thanks to an interesting strategic choice: to look for stronger, more stable wind at the coast, before rounding Rochebonne. This operation enabled them to pass the mark at the head of the fleet, which Xavier Macaire, Tanguy Bouroullec and Hugo Cardon would stay with until the finish in La Trinité-sur-mer.
While the 3 scows battled hard, so did the 6 sharp boats. At the end of 4 days and 9 hours, it was the crew of TrimContrôl, Alexandre Le Gallais and Henry de Malet, who came out on top.
Xavier Macaire: “It was a great race, we had a good rhythm. It wasn't a foregone conclusion from the start, but that spiced up the match. We passed Wolf Rock behind Swift, but we didn't want to let him gain ground. We battled hard and chose the right options. The three of us got on really well together, with Tanguy with whom I'd already sailed on Les Sables-Horta last year, and Hugo, who knows the boat from a delivery trip from Marseille to Les Sables d'Olonne. There was a great chemistry between us, and it was really great. After the Drheam Cup mark, the route was blocked by the anticyclone. We had two options: go around the anticyclone to the south, or go north of the bubble and head east towards Pointe Bretagne. If we went east, the routing had us far behind the others. So we started heading south, but when we analyzed the new files, we realized that the easterly option was now better. There was a choice to be made, we had to make a decision, we couldn't change our minds any more, we really had to choose. It seemed safer and less risky to go east, to Pointe Bretagne. Shortly afterwards, Swift broke away from this option and changed course to head south. We weren't far behind them, trying to overtake them before the finish. We continued with our option, which we had decided on on the basis of our convictions and our feeling. By deciding to change their route, they opened a door for us. On our side, we never doubted and it really worked. We took advantage of this opportunity to get ahead of them, and then we didn't let up. We just kept widening the gap with them, continuing to sail as if we were side by side with other boats. We're very happy that our option paid off.”
Source : Service de presse X. Macaire.
Classement général : Drheam Cup - Class40
Classement Trophée Europe : europeantrophy24postdrheamcup.pdf (class40.com)
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