France takes double gold at Sailing World Cup in Hyères

France’s Paralympic sailors dominated the results by winning both gold medals at the ISAF Sailing World Cup in Hyères.

The penultimate World Cup of the year, with the Paralympic events wrapping up on 26 April, saw almost 40 athletes from 11 countries compete in two disciplines – the one-person 2.4mR class and the three-person sonar class.

Damien Seguin secured the victory in the final 2.4mR race of the week, en route to winning the class by four points.

"This year was really difficult because the weather conditions were not really good for me,” said Seguin, who picked up his sixth World Cup gold since 2008 despite difficult conditions on the French Riviera.

Aussie sailor Matthew Bugg finished second, whilst last year’s Hyères winner Heiko Kroeger of Germany took home the bronze medal.

"It was a really big battle for me between the Brits, (Norway’s) Bjørnar Erikstad, the Germans and everybody, so I am happy,” Seguin said.

The French trio of Bruno Jourdren, Eric Flageul and Nicolas Vimont-Vicary raced to gold in the sonar class, winning four of the eight races to finish ahead of Colin Harrison, Jonathan Harris and Russell Boaden of Australia; the victory was secured in the final race.

"We only had one point between us and the Australians and we were just behind them, which was enough to win,” Jourdren said.

"We've been coming to Hyères for many years and we're happy we've won. It was a good day for the French and we hope the others like the 470s and Nacra add some more French victories,” Jourden added.

The next ISAF Sailing World Cup regatta takes place in Weymouth and Portland (UK) in June and will see the return of the two-person skud-18 class.