Just another day at the office
Many of the women on the WIM Series live for sailing in general, and particularly for match racing. French top class sailor Anne-Claire Le Berre is no exception. At the age of 32 she’s already got more sailing experience than most of us will gain during our whole lives.
It all started in Brest in French Brittany, where she began sailing and racing already as a child. It was also in Brest that she later joined the sailing programme that the French Marine runs in cooperation with the French Sailing Federation, an enrollment that ensured a fruitful environment to continue her development as a professional sailor:
“Every year I had to teach French Marine officers about sailing for a couple of months, but I was allowed to spend the rest of the time on my own sailing career” Anne-Claire explains.
She stayed in the Marine programme for eight years, taking part in three Olympic campaigns and sailing a large number of different boats in regattas all over the world. Her great interest in sailing not only lead her to boyfriend Gautier Levisse, technical director at the Banque Populaire sailing project in Lorient, but also to a civil career as yacht designer. In 2009 she graduated as civil engineer in Rennes, followed 2012 – 13 by naval studies in Paris-La Villette Architectural University.
Last year Anne-Claire Le Berre left the French Marine, and she is now working at the famous French yacht design office of Finot-Conq in Vannes. Her speciality is CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics), a computerized tool that replaces old-fashioned costly and time-inefficient testing in towing tanks:
“CFD allows testing of several families of hulls, in several configurations. This is a major asset in the design phase, the only limit being the available computer CPU time” Le Berre explains.
For this WIM Series season Anne-Claire Le Berre came back to the match racing after a maternity leave with 1,5 years old son Tristan. She will participate in most of the WIM Series events, and has already reached a fifth place in the World Championship in Cork, Ireland, and a podium finish in the Women’s Match Race Golfe du Morbihan. Still her life circles around sailing, so it goes without saying that being on the race course seems like just another day at the office for Anne-Claire Le Berre.
Anne-Claire Le Berre:
32 years old
Lives in Lorient, in French Brittany
Grew up in Brest, also in Brittany
Working as yacht designer at Finot Conq in Vannes
Lives together with Gautier Levisse, engineer at the Banque Populaire sailing project
Member of the Société des Régates de Brest
For match racing, her favourite boat is the Tom 28, but she also appreciate multihulls like the Formula 18
(More info on Anne-Claire and team here: Anne-Claire Le Berre – Team Xavier Bourhis – L’assureur Plaisance)
Follow Anne-Claire and the other teams as the compete in Lysekil Women’s Match this coming week!
Images:
Anne-Claire Le Berre at the Finot-Conq office.
Anne-Claire Le Berre on sea trials with Pogo 40S3, a recent Finot-Conq design.
