Franck Cammas' crew didn't ease off the pace one iota and they have nothing to be sorry about this evening. Indeed it all came down to the last race of this Dutch weekend of sailing. As stipulated in the ruling, the last race scores double points and is hence referred to as the killer race by a number of the competitors; the all or nothing race!

Today, Groupama won the last race hands down, enabling the skipper from Aix en Provence to regain his smile as he snatched third place behind Yann Guichard and Loïck Peyron, who take first and second place respectively. As was the case in Kiel, the French sailors are at the front of the pack with a French triple in the top spots once again!

If we look in detail at the points separating the top five competitors in the final ranking, it is easy to understand the tension which was palpable throughout the day! With the wind still a little undecided as to whether it was going to fill their sails, today's five races were rather convoluted to say the least and rather reminiscent of the four race yesterday. Franck Cammas: "One thing for sure after these three days racing in Amsterdam, is that with Groupama 40, we still haven't worked out how to deal with light conditions. In light wind we're not so at ease. We aren't able to follow the others. This was my first participation in the light stuff on such a narrow race zone. We unquestionably need to make progress! The minute the wind kicked in, things went better. In fact on Friday, thanks to the breeze, it was a good day for us!"

The famous quote by competitors that says that "anything can happen in a race prior to crossing the finish line" is something that certainly applies to Franck's crew this weekend :"With Groupama 40, we won the lottery in the last race. Our rivals weren't as strong which enabled us to overtake two of them and make it to a podium finish, which certainly wasn't something we could have envisaged at the end of the previous race!"
The skipper from Aix en Provence clearly already has his mind geared towards the last event of the season: "In Alméria, it's likely to be windy and it will be a whole different ball game! Roll on Spain!"

Finally, it is important to salute the performance by Yann Guichard and his men, outright winner in this Dutch stage. Bagging three victories of the 17 races contested, Gitana Extreme- LCF Rothschild Group climbs to the highest step of the podium and above all is tied on points with Masirah in the general championship ranking.
Suffice to say that the next meeting for the Extremes 40s will take place in Alméria, Spain, on 10th, 11th and 12th October and it is going to have a decisive role in this championship! This sixth event will round off the iShares Cup 2009.