Paul Lewis: The questions around France’s late America’s Cup entry

SailGP helmsman Quentin Delapierre will likely be part of the new French team. Photo / Getty

OPINION:

France’s late entry to the 37th America’s Cup in Barcelona has inevitably raised questions about their credibility as challengers – but their lateness will not necessarily affect their competitiveness.

There are still a lot of unanswered questions about France’s K-Challenge – where the money is coming from is one, another is whether they will have too much ground to make up when it comes to design and testing.

The money question may be answered later this month with a sponsorship announcement. Among the heavy hitters who could be bankrolling the challenge is the man recently named as the richest in the world – Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy founder Bernard Arnault, said to be worth US$200 billion and who recently took the title of the planet’s wealthiest man after the downturn in the fortunes of Elon Musk.

Louis Vuitton have a long history with the America’s Cup, sponsoring the challenger series from 1983-2007, when they terminated their involvement, saying that “business” had encroached too far in the organisation of the Cup – a bit of a poke at then holders, Alinghi, and their principal, Ernesto Bertarelli. Alinghi and Bertarelli are among the challengers in Barcelona next year – along with Ineos Britannia, American Magic, Luna Rossa and now K-Challenge.

Another potential sponsorship candidate for K-Challenge is the French-based Accor hotel group, the largest in Europe and one of the biggest in the world.

Playing catch-up is not recommended in most America’s Cup cycles and particularly in the foiling monohulls – where design is an even more key element than previous Cups. However, under the Cup rules governing this regatta, K-Challenge do have options.

They can either buy a first generation AC75 boat, as Alinghi have done, and gather data and time on the water to inform the building of their race boat next year. It’s not known where that first-generation boat might come from (Alinghi bought Team New Zealand’s) – but a smarter play might be, with the money men on board, to buy a design package from another team.

The 37th America’s Cup rules allow that and the most obvious port of call for K-Challenge could well be Team NZ. That would enable them to begin their race yacht build later this year – as all other teams will do.

The French are also not short of world-class sailing and foiling experience. Stephane Kandler, CEO of K-Challenge, has been around a long time and was involved with K-Challenge’s last America’s Cup gig in Valencia in 2007 (where they were known as Areva). Bruno Dubois manages their SailGP team, currently running third, very close behind New Zealand.

While the sailing team hasn’t yet been announced, it’s likely that the talented Quentin Delapierre will head it up as helmsman, as he does in the SailGP team – which also includes America’s Cup grinders Matthieu Vandame and Olivier Herledant. The latter pair was part of France’s Groupama team at the 2017 Bermuda America’s Cup, at which Team NZ relieved Oracle Team USA of the “Auld Mug”.

Groupama didn’t make it through to the challenger semifinals in that regatta and many will not assign much chance to K-Challenge this time round. However, they will still take delivery of their 40-foot test boat and will be able to compete in the Cup pre-regattas, starting in October and which Team NZ is scheduled to announce by April.

Two of those will be sailed in European venues in the AC 40s while the third will be contested in AC75s.