| MARSEILLE, FRANCE-(16-10-2002) Part of the Mumm 30 circuit, the Pro-Am Cup will be at the front of Marseilles’ old harbour stage from tomorrow morning, and what a distribution ! Well known and international skippers and teams will fight the all week-end in the fantastic Marseilles’ sailing area :
We will find amongst the guests Kito de Pavant, this year’s winner of “La Solitaire du Figaro”, but also Pierre Loïc Berthet and the « Nantes Saint-Nazaire » team, very dangerous competitors as they have won this season all the regattas on Mumm they have taken part to (the “Spi Ouest France”, “La Semaine de La Rochelle”, and above all, the “Tour de France à la Voile”); will they add the Pro-Am Cup to their prize-list ?
We can notice they will challenge last year’s winner : Vasco Vascotto, who also won the Cassis Cup on Mumm boats.
Lastly, Thierry Péponnet (Olympic medallist) and Nicolas Charbonnier, (five times dinghy world champion and 470 European champion this year, who also won “La Route des Iles” on Mumm 30 a few weeks earlier for the youth category), will be there to take the start; they will be at helm of the team K-Challenge boats (1 and 2), team who won recently the One Ton Cup in Saint-Tropez, as the Pro-Am Cup is also part of their training programme this year for the America’s Cup 2006.
Alain Fédensieu, well-known local sailor from Marseilles, will also be with Nicolas Charbonnier as the tactician on board. As he was doing the same job when they got the victory in the One Ton Cup, this is very promising regarding what is gonna happen in the sailing area !
There will be 22 participants this year, which is a “first time” performance for this regatta which gathers more and more boats ready to take up the challenge : Swiss, French, English, Italians, Israeli,… the regatta raises a lot of interests…
The boat of the city of Marseilles will have Dimitri Deruelle at helm (winner of the Primo Cup).
Then we will find lots of participants from the “Tour de France à la Voile” : Bandol, CSC ESSEC (2nd in the amateur placing on the « Tour »), Ville d’Antibes, but also the English team of Asterix, the Triga Swiss team (with the crew from “Ville de Genève”, 3rd on the “Tour”), and Team Israël.
Lights are on them, the ballet is about to start on the water, see you tomorrow evening for the first results of the “regatta casting”.
The Pro-Am Cup was created in 1997 by K-Yachting International. This regatta allows amateur skippers to fight equally with the world top sailors. The race gathers the Mumm 30 owners (9m length regatta monotype) and professional skippers especially invited and selected. Loïck Peyron, Franck Cammas, Bertrand Pacé, Jochen Schumann are part of the “stars“ who already came for the challenge.
The Pro-Am Cup shall be governed by the ISAF (International Sailing Federation) sailing rules, as well as the French Mumm 30 Class rules.
2 general placings will be produced : the “Pro-Am Cup” one for all the boats registered in the regatta, and the “Amateur” one for all the boats which has been given this status by K-Yachting International.
| 
