Pablo RUIZ PONCE / María Del Mar GIL ROIG (ESP) © Sailing Energy/World Sailing
MISTRAL MAKES FOR FAST, FUN (AND SOMETIMES FURIOUS) SEMAINE OLYMPIQUE FRANÇAISE OPENER
24 Apr 2023The 54th Semaine Olympique Française de Hyères - TPM opened in classic Côte d’Azur conditions with unending sunshine and a 25-knot Mistral mixing it up across fleets. It was a day for flying, punctuated by nosedives, capsizes and white knuckle rides in short steep waves.
Hyères has hosted over half a century of elite racing but rarely has the pressure been so high for some, on and off the water, with less than 500 days to go until the start of the Paris 2024 Olympics. For many nations this event will finally decide who will represent them at the Olympic Test Event in Marseille in July and for some even for the Olympics next year.
470 (mixed double-handed dinghy)
More fickle conditions and the odd wind hole on some courses in the afternoon possibly explain the chopping and changing in the blue fleet compared to the almost metronomic yellow fleet, who unusually provide all top five boats on the overall leaderboard. Jordi Xammar- Hernandez, Spain’s Tokyo bronze medallist in the last all-male 470 event, now partnered with Nora Brugman, won both their races, both times ahead of France’s Hippolyte Machetti and Aloïse Retornaz, (a bronze medallist in Tokyo in the women’s 470), who were second here last year.