After 4h 38m of racing, the 2023 Geneve-Rolle-Geneve came down to a high-speed sprint to the finish line, with Bertrand Demole at the helm of Ylliam XII - Comptoir Immobilier, taking the win.
The long-distance race, a prologue to the renowned Bol d'Or Mirabaud, started at 13:00CET with over 200 other boats on the line. Among the TF35 fleet, ZEN Too had the best start at the pin end of the line and took an early lead. In 7-8 knots of northeasterly breeze, Ylliam XII - Comptoir Immobilier and Ylliam 17 started on foils but quickly dropped into low mode to gain better pointing ability and match the rest of the fleet as they made their way upwind.
For much of the first leg to Rolle, the wind remained the same, the boats, along with their highly focused crews, were in sight of each other. The lead changed hands on a regular basis, as the tacticians and trimmers battled to find an edge on the fickle lake.
"There was more wind than we had originally thought," explained ZEN Too trimmer Nicolas Berthoud (Canard). "We got off to a great start in the Séchard wind (northeasterly). We were a bit lost between Hermance and Yvoire but got back into the chase."
On the approach to Rolle, as the teams left Le Petit Lac with Ylliam 17 in the lead, the wind dropped out, bringing the fleet to a standstill as the ominous-looking clouds building up on the west side of the lake started to rumble with thunder.
At the turning point, Ylliam XII - Comptoir Immobilier was the first TF35 to crawl around the mark, followed a moment later by ZEN Too. Ylliam 17 and Spindrift passed quick succession behind in third and fourth, with Realteam in fifth and Alinghi Red Bull Racing in sixth.
With the cloud cover thickening for the race's second half, the breeze returned as a volatile Joran wind (southwest), resulting in the fleet again battling it out upwind on the way back to Geneva. "It was a very tactical race. I was expecting and hoping for a downwind leg to be able to go a bit faster and allow us to foil, but that is typical of the lake, so you just have to think to yourself, 'OK here we go back upwind again,' and you fight for your position. This keeps you focused," explained helm Julien Firmenich.
As the teams passed Hermance on the return, the breeze kicked in, the crews switched to flying mode, and the race was on between the leading three boats: Spindrift, Ylliam XII - Comptoir Immobilier and Ylliam 17.
In the end, Ylliam XII - Comptoir Immobilier prevailed: "The wind changed 180° and came in strong, so to finish foiling upwind instead of downwind was a little different," revealed Billy Besson. "We had the boat fully set up for a light breeze, so when we were hit with gusts of 23 knots, our whole focus was stability. The top priority was controlling the boat; it wasn't scary but needed to be managed to ensure we could race to the end. The team is thrilled to win; we've had two really good days."
In second and third place, respectively, finishing within two minutes of the winners, was the latest team to join the fleet, Firmenich's Ylliam 17 and Guy de Picciotto's ZEN Too, helmed by Loïc Forestier.
"The last leg was super exciting. We were waiting for the strong wind that we knew would come at some point. When it did, we were ready, but unfortunately, one of our flaps was stuck in the high position on the starboard side, so our boat was at an angle, and we couldn't fly properly. We fought hard to skim along just flying and hold our position to make it across the finish line," added Firmenich.
"It was shaping up to be an exciting finish between us (Ylliam XII), Ylliam 17, Spindrift and ZEN," Besson concludes. "Spindrift was in the lead, but then they just stopped. It must have been painful for them to have a technical at that point, but it's part of the game. These boats are like Formula 1; they are so finely tuned that sometimes they break and take you out of the race. But it could happen to anyone."
Tomorrow championship racing will continue with day two of the Realstone Cup for Leman hope. Follow live at TF35.org
