With the award ceremony of the Centennial race in fabulous salons in New York, the curtain fell on THE BRIDGE, a daring event carried with incredible energy and raised an exceptional wave of emotions, and lots of great successes.
THE BRIDGE's magic has taken over from the first bounces of the World Cup of basketball 3 x 3 in Nantes until the ultimate trimarans' arrivals under the Verrazano bridge, not to mention the return of Queen Mary 2 in her construction harbour, followed by the Centennial Transat, and images have not finished to go around the world.
This composite event carrying a huge symbolic value by mixing basketball, sailing, music and History, has kept all its promise. It even exceeded all the hopes of its creator and organizer, Damien Grimont, who pulled off an incredible feat in order to build bridges towards the world of tomorrow.
We build too many walls and not enough bridges
Isaac Newton
For three weeks as part of a new closed-door entrepreneurship in Nantes and Saint-Nazaire, on the ocean and up to New York, THE BRIDGE has echoed the maxim of Issac Newton, "We build too many walls and not enough bridges". Throughout the three weeks of festivities, those unifying words have reasoned on both sides of the Atlantic to commemorate a large page of History and celebrate 100 years of Franco-American friendship.
Damien Grimont, creator and organizer of THE BRIDGE: : « What interests me most in the transat between ultimate trimarans, whose arrivals closed THE BRIDGE, is to accompany the turn which the sail is taking. François Gabart, winner of the ultimate trimaran transat, told me, quite rightly, that sailing has experienced major developments in the past five or six years. For fifteen years I have organized events around offshore races with Profile Grand Large. And, THE BRIDGE - like SNSM Record is dedicated to sea rescuers volunteers, or Solidaire du Chocolat which raised €500,000 of funds for 25 associations – aims to bring audiences together as well as abolishing borders.
For me, an event must be a catalyst, an accelerator for a cause or bring a positive transformation of society. THE BRIDGE, with the very symbolic race against Queen Mary 2, was envisioned as a way to support today’s sailing revolution, showing us a way to an energetic transition.
THE BRIDGE, it is also a composite event driven by the will to throw bridges between different wolrds and meet the logic that "one plus one equals three." We have gathered basketball, sailing, music and History with the Centennial of the 1917 American landing, around Queen Mary 2. This ocean liner embodies the human work and remains the powerful and central component of the event, which has drawn its strength from the territory’s vitality. A ship like this, it's four million hours and more than 100,000 people who interacted closely or indirectly, during its construction. During the three weeks of the event, each of the actors and participants has built its own "bridge"; and we had all along, in Nantes, Saint-Nazaire and up to New York, a lot of shared emotions that went beyond our wildest expectations. »
Standing of the Transat of THE Centennial BRIDGE
1 / MACIF (François Gabart): 8D 00 h 31 min 20 s race, 3582.1 nm traveled at 18.6 knots on average
2 / IDEC SPORT (Francis Joyon): 8D 11 h 09 min 03 s, 3486.6 nm traveled at 17.2 knots on average / gap with the winner: 10 h 37 min 43 sec
3 / Sodebo Ultim' (Thomas Coville): 8D 16 h 18 min 55 s, 3549.2 traveled at 17.0 nm knots on average / gap with the winner: 15 h 47 min 35 s
4 / Actual (Yves Le Blevec): 10D 09 h 28 min 58 sec, 3609.9 miles at 14.5 knots on average / gap with the winner : 2D 08 h 57 min 38 sec
The crews
Actual : Yves Le Blévec (skipper), Samantha Davies, Davy Beaudart, Jean-Baptiste Le Vaillant, Stan Thuret
IDEC SPORT : Francis Joyon (skipper), Gwénolé Gahinet, Alex Pella, Sébastien Picault, Quentin Ponroy
MACIF : François Gabart (skipper), Pascal Bidégorry, Guillaume Combescure, Antoine Gautier, Benoît Marie, Yann Riou
Sodebo Ultim’ : Thomas Coville (skipper), Billy Besson, Thierry Briend, Loïc Le Mignon, Jean-Luc Nélias, Vincent Riou