The Outremer Cup (Outremer is the manufacturer of our boat, Wally Walou) is Outremer’s annual “company picnic” with 20+ catamarans competing in 3 days of races, plus training classes and social events.  We had a very good outcome at this year’s Outremer Cup races: we won!

We have been in friendly contact with the two French sailors that originally commissioned Wally Walou, Laurent and Gerome, and we were lucky enough to get them both to come race with us this year. We also had our sailmaker, Alain, from Delta Voiles aboard and an American couple, Matt and Tricia, that own an Outremer 42 from Seattle, so we had a good experienced French contingent to support us less experienced but enthusiastic Americans!

Our goal was to continue the legend of Wally Walou, which had won the Outremer Cup numerous times before. To accomplish that goal it was important to make Wally as lightweight as possible; so, our American guests agreed to take our SUPs to their B&B, and we left our dinghy at our slip with our primary anchor and all of our primary chain and rode. Also our passerelle (gangplank) and the few “heavy” fenders that Laurent identified (he did approve of our lightweight fendertex fenders:-). We also unloaded the 50 lb sewing machine and some of Dave’s tools into a crew member’s car. So we were taking the race reasonably seriously. There were 26 Outremers racing, from the smallest O38/40 to the largest the O5X (60ft).  Here is Dave’s summary of the 3 days of races…

Day 1 – I had 2 of my French crew attend the skippers’ meeting with me and we still managed to almost miss the existence of the first day’s regatta. They had a “timed run” again this year and we were thinking that this was all we were doing. So after the run we went out in the bay and Laurent and I went swimming to scrub the last infinitesimal layer of slime off both hulls and rudders to improve our light air performance. This is what you get when you invite crazy racers aboard your boat:-). I think we had wine and lunch out when we heard the 10-minute warning announced over the radio and we were all shouting “What race?!!!” We got our act together and with Laurent’s guidance got a very decent start and started to pull away from the fleet. Wind was very light, 4-8 knots max for most to the first race, and only the first 5 boats made it around the first windward mark before the wind died. So Wally Walou and four others kept going and the rest of the fleet sat there drifting waiting for the wind to come back and watching us go! We managed to stay in the lead until partway up the second windward leg and Crazy Flavour had slightly better wind and managed to pass us. As we approached the windward mark for our second rounding the rest of the fleet was starting to move again so things got interesting as we ducked and dodged our way through. In the end we were third behind Crazy Flavour (Carbon 49 or 51) and Excalibur, a brand new 5X.

Day 2 was again very light wind, so light that initially they called a pause and the whole fleet motored over east of Port Camargue and everyone went swimming. The wind came up a bit and we got two races in with a few fleet recalls since 25% of the boats were over the start line early. We got good starts and made very few mistakes taking 1st in both races. The carbon 51s, Crazy Flavour and Vitamine, and the Aussie 5X Excaliber were always close and a threat.

Day 3 was more light wind. We had 11 crew aboard, 9 of them French!  1 race planned and started on time. With Laurent’s expert advice we again got a good start position. This race had the whole fleet parked for a while waiting for wind. We were in good position when the wind died, we were sort of ahead with Crazy Flavour, Vitamine and Ritual leeward of us and slightly behind and Excalibur to windward but slightly back as we drifted.  We had been on a downwind run when the wind died.  As we waited we noticed some monohulls sailing down toward our position flying Spinnakers. We quickly dropped our chute and unfurled our Genoa since the new wind was going to be forward of our beam. Excalibur got the wind first but we were able to make the mark ahead of them and barely managed to hold off Vitamine for a final 1st place!

Wally Walou is one of 2 Danson 45s with a lighter hull layup (same layup they used for the 55 light series) and the only Danson 45 with a carbon rotating mast.  Our lightship weight (delivered?) is 6100 kg and our Max is 8500kg. We have been making modifications to Wally over the last 18 months, most of which have added weight and decreased performance. I’ve been worried that we may have messed up Wally Walou…we are now over that worry:-).

Laurent was of the opinion (and I agree) that we had the perfect conditions for Wally Walou. If the wind had been 15 kts or more the 51s and 5Xs would have been fully on their feet and caused us much more grief. We had a very good crew on a well prepared, light Outremer, and we made very few mistakes.