After the Ocean Fifty class last week, we continue our tour of the classes with, this Friday, the Figaro Beneteau class, which continues to focus on diversity gender and youth training, a strategy that seems to be bearing fruit, with registrations on the rise and boats not depreciating in value despite the tense economic climate. The only fly in the ointment is the financing of the races, and therefore the calendar.
The Solo Guy Cotten, one of the four events in the 2025 French Elite ocean racing championship, will open the Figaro Beneteau class season from March 22 to 29, with the calendar unveiled this week. This event is also open this year to double-handed as part of the Academy, the scheme designed to promote access to the circuit. “This sums up the current state of mind which is to offer versatile races, where as many people as possible can get involved,” sums up Irish Marcus Hutchinson, vice-president of the class.
Julie Royer Coutts, General Manager of OC Sport Pen Duick, which organizes the Transat Paprec and Solitaire du Figaro Paprec, adds that “the mayonnaise is taking off“, delighted to see that for the double-handed transatlantic race “entries are increasing and the format has found its audience”. For its second edition in mixed doubles, the transatlantic race will welcome no fewer than twenty duos, compared with just eleven in 2023. “We may have been short of fighters in the past, so we had to get past the critics. What’s really positive is that this is bringing out ‘mercenary’ profiles in women sailors that only men had before,” comments Eléonore de Grissac, general secretary of the class.
The latter names Estelle Greck, partnered by Victor Le Pape, Sophie Faguet, with Jules Ducelier, and Mathilde Géron who will be lining up alongside Martin Le Pape. All of these pairs could come to play spoilsport against the favorite duo of Charlotte Yven and Hugo Dhallenne on Skipper Macif, the defending champion. “Above all, behind the scenes, it allows more and more women to go solo. They will be at least ten this year on the Solitaire” adds Eléonore de Grissac, who expects the total number of entrants to be “roughly equivalent to 2024”, (37). The Paprec Challenge, which gives the newcomers the opportunity to discover the Solitaire by racing the first leg double-handed, will be repeated, with around ten tandems expected.
“A good generation of 18-24 year olds”
The diversification of profiles also applies foreign skippers, such as American Erica Lush, Britons Ellen Driver and Catherine Hunt, and Maggie Adamson and Calanach Finlayson, who recently won the offshore mixed doubles world championship. All these sailors may well have been inspired by last year’s Solitaire winner Tom Dolan, who will be defending his title in 2025.
But it’s the younger generation in that the class continues to particular attract, with profiles such as sailor Cindy Brin, from Saint-Barthélémy, Hugo Cardon, or Typhaine Rideau and Pier Paolo Dean, who will be racing the Transat Paprec together but are also looking to go solo. Set up since 2023 to attract them, the Academy will feature nine races in 2025, including the Tour Voile, which still requires two crew members under the age of 26 on board. “The Academy enables us to have sailors who then build up their career in the class over several years,” enthuses Eléonore de Grissac.
After racing theTour Voile crew last year alongside the experienced Basile Bourgnon and Pep Costa, 21-year-old Titouan Marilley will for example be making his solo debut. “The Figaro today is the perfect blend of dinghy sailing and ocean racing,” sums up the skipper from Le Trinité-sur-Mer. The Tour Voile really boosted the dynamic, and today we’re a good generation of 18-24 year-olds. And in terms of investment, the Figaro 3 is a safe bet. Virtually all the boats are sailing, whereas a few years ago, there were some on dry land.”
A sign of the good class’ health the second-hand market is still buoyant, with several new boats even sold over the winter. “Above all, the calendar is so intense and varied that more and more sailors are sharing boats the same season,” says Marcus Hutchinson, himself owner of four boats that will “sail in virtually all the races, but with different skippers. It’ sa good way of adapting the business model in an unfavorable context for finding budget.”
A “small revolution”
on communication
Still looking for partners for the Vendée Globe 2028 Martin Le Pape has also come back to the Figaro 3, which he sees as “a safe haven, a bit like gold in times of economic crisis”. He adds: “The class has stood the test of time, while remaining an undisputed benchmark, a must, as we saw again in the Vendée Globe. If you really want to know your level on the water, you have to do the Figaro.” His only regret: “That there aren’t more old-timers coming back to do the Solitaire. It used to be done a lot, it added spice and got more media coverage and therefore better returns on investment for sponsors.”
With a view to improving this aspect, at the end of 2024 the class members voted in favor of “a small revolution” in communications, namely a system to facilitate the sending of on-board images while continuing to restrict the reception of datas. “We needed to catch up. It’s not a question of denying ourselves, just moving with the times,” explains Marcus Hutchinson. “It was a quite technical challenge, especially on such a small boat. It puts severe constraints on the choice of equipment and energy consumption,” explains Benoît Marsille of ROM-arrangé, who worked on the subject alongside the class and Teem.
In the end, it’s the Starlink Mini antenna, coupled with a box that will limit feeds, that will be installed on board all Figaro Beneteau 3s for the Transat Paprec and Solitaire du Figaro Paprec in 2025, and will be mandatory in 2026 for all championship races. “Technically, it’s ideal, even if ethically, it raises questions,” Benoît Marsille. Cost of installation? 1,600 euros per boat. While the class has contributed financially to the development of the device, OC Sport is financing a third of the sum this year, with the remainder going to the racers and owners.
Constrained budgetary races
Despite this good overall picture, the context economic remains the black spot of this 2025 season, both for skippers and for race organizers, whose public-private financing model is being challenged. “The climate is inevitably complicated, the deadlines are getting longer and the process decision-making even longer, which means that the 2025 course has not yet been finalized,” explains Emmanuel Bachellerie, managing director of Ultim Sailing, organizer of the Tour Voile, which will be raced in Figaro 3s until at least 2029. We’re very careful to work hand in hand with the local authorities. Given the climate, if we get between 14 and 17 boats, we’ll be happy.”
“We know that the years 2025 and 2026 are going to be rather gray, so we have to manage to align everyone’s stakes,” agrees Julie Royer Coutts, general manager of OC Sport Pen Duick, which has renewed its agreement with the Figaro group to organize the Solitaire until 2036, but has lost key partners, Loire-Atlantique and the Pays de la Loire region. Hence, once again, delay in announcing the course for the 2025 edition.
The organizer and the class also differ on the date of the event. While the skippers and the class want to keep it at the end of the summer as the sporting highlight of the season, OC Sport Pen Duick is pushing to bring the forward to event June. “Ten years ago, local authorities wanted to liven up the summer season for tourists, but today their interests are more focused on their inhabitants and the fact that the town is alive all year round,” explains Julie Royer Coutts.
Joseph Bizard, Manager General of OC Sport, is more direct: “We feel that in these somewhat difficult times, the race must be well positioned in the calendar, because it’s a jewel to be preserved. Even if it’s not the official reason, it’s also one of the reasons why the Loire-Atlantique département pulled out, as it for them to was becoming complicated to organize a race in the off-season. That’s why we’re having discussions – and disagreements – with the class about repositioning it in the pre-season, and thus enabling it to have more spin-offs.” Marcus Hutchinson doesn’t play down , this reality even though he believes in “new inventing models: we have to do more with less. But we’ve got everything we need to keep up the good work.”
Photo : Simeli Prod
