My first season in the Beneteau Figaro 2 class came to an end last week when we finished the Quiberon Solo. The event is normally a mixture of inshore and coastal races, however due to a week dominated by light winds, the two coastal races were cancelled and we ended up racing 6 inshore races.

Light airs at the Solo Quiberon

The first day I learnt a few lessons the hard way about sailing short courses with a relatively big fleet to what I am used to, I had a few silly errors which proved to be expensive and meant my week was off to a bad start.

In the winter training, my manoeuvres were my strongest asset, so, it was especially disappointing to be let down by some messy manoeuvres in the couple races mid-week in the Solo Quiberon. Thankfully, in the last couple days of racing, things started to fall together a bit more and I was able to put up a fight within the top 10 and finish the week, event and season on a high, to finish in 18th overall.

Watch my Solo Quiberon video blog here.

I can now safely say that after my first year in the Figaro, I have caught the bug and can’t wait to get back into it next year.  From the very beginning it has been very productive and I know that if I can secure a partner to work with for the next year I can continue progressing towards my eventual aim of running a competitive Vendee Globe Campaign.

Winning the Artemis Offshore Academy Scholarship has helped me make a big step forwards in my career as an offshore sailor and thankfully I’ve now been given the opportunity to continue that with Team Concise in this years’ Transat Jacques Vabre. I owe a big thanks to all the people that have given me the opportunity and helped me a long the way.

We are already deep into final preparations and training for the Transat Jacques Vabre starting in 24 days. We are also hoping to get out with the other British Class 40 team, Hannah Jenner and Peter Harding on 40 Degrees, in the next couple weeks for some speed testing.

After the race, I will be returning to the Figaro training camp of CEM in La Grand Motte with the Artemis Offshore Academy and aim to get the search of securing support to do another Figaro campaign next year underway quickly. The Selection Trials happened last week for the new Development Squad and we are looking forward to meeting the new recruits and getting out sailing with them as soon as possible.

All for now,
Sam