Brest (AFP)

The Double Transat, a sailing race between Concarneau and Saint-Barthélémy which was due to start on Sunday and promises to be very open, was postponed on Saturday due to stormy weather.

The kick-off was postponed to a later date "because of the very difficult weather conditions expected over the next few days in the Bay of Biscay and around Cape Finisterre," the organizers told AFP.

The postponement date will be communicated later, they added.

This fifteenth edition, in which 18 crews participate, is "in continuity" with an identical course to the previous ones, while welcoming "something new with a new boat", reports to AFP Francis Le Goff, director of this flagship event of the elite French offshore racing championship.

The Figaro Bénéteau 3 series monohull, launched three years ago but for which it will be the first transatlantic, "brings youth back to this event" where the competitors are fighting on equal terms, on identical boats, welcomes Francis Le Goff .

Slightly smaller than its predecessor (9.75 m against 10.10), lighter (150 kg less), the monohull is equipped with foils, these appendages placed on each side of the hull, which can thus rise outside some water.

Its more modern sail plan should also change the way sailors approach the event.

"Physically, the crossing will be much more involved, especially since the boat is very wet. And it will undoubtedly be necessary to steer even more. In short, we are going to change the world", judge Gildas Mahé, associated with Tom Dolan.

- "Everything is turned upside down" -

The cards end up being redistributed.

"There is not a sailor who knows the boat better than another, so everything is turned upside down, everyone is at the same level", emphasizes Francis Le Goff, deeming "really impossible" any prognosis among the professional skippers. engaged.

"The game is super open, at the slightest mistake you can lose a lot of places", abounds Violette Dorenge.

The 20-year-old sailor will take the start with the Briton Alan Roberts with the aim of "getting to the end", possibly "in the top ten" and "having fun".

Sailors will however have to be particularly vigilant in the face of a possible breakage of equipment.

"The boat is very dynamic and responsive, maybe also faster, but there are also a lot of things that are perhaps not yet fully developed", underlines the youngest of the event and the youngest woman of history to participate.

The Transat, which is usually held every two years for 3,890 miles (7,205 km) between Concarneau and Gustavia, via a passage mark in the Canaries, was won by big names in ocean racing such as Michel Desjoyeaux, his very first winner in tandem with Jacques Caraès.

But also by Armel Le Cléac'h, the only skipper to have won it twice (2004, 2010).

Only one woman has taken the lead so far, Karine Fauconnier (associated with Lionel Lemonchois) in 2000.

During the last edition, in 2018, the duo Thomas Rettant and Adrien Hardy smashed the 2006 record with a crossing in 18 days, 11 hours and 48 minutes.

Will the new foiling boats allow a new record?

Answer at the end of May.

© 2021 AFP