Blueshift Sailing Team Clinches ETF26 Mar Menor Grand Prix Title

Henri Demesmaeke, Charles Dorange, and Rasmus Rosengren sailed Blueshift Sailing Team to victory at the Mar Menor Grand Prix, the opening event of the 2026 ETF26 Series, completing 14 races over four days off the beaches of Los Alcázares, Spain.

The regatta, which ran March 11 to 14, carried more significance than a season opener. For the first time in the class's history, every boat in the ETF26 fleet took to the water fitted with the new-generation foils, a development that has been anticipated for several seasons. The new foils allow the ETF26 to fly upwind and get airborne in wind conditions that would have kept the older setup firmly on the water.

Matthieu Salomon, skipper of Entreprises du Morbihan, put it plainly: "It was clearly a light-wind regatta this week. With the old foils, we probably wouldn't have flown. Now we were able to race in super light conditions, which is a real revolution. These foils will allow us to use the boat's full potential, from light winds to strong winds."

That kind of light-air flight capability changes the calculus of ETF26 racing considerably. When a foiling cat that can reach 35 knots (65 km/h) in good breeze can now also get up and flying in a drifter, the tactical picture across the fleet shifts entirely. The fact that every team arrived at Mar Menor already running the new foils suggests the class took to the upgrade without hesitation.

Six boats from Canada, France, and the UK made up the fleet, racing across Mar Menor's sheltered waters while spectators tracked the action from the Los Alcázares seafront walk. Four days of racing produced 14 completed races in conditions described as light and at times unpredictable, exactly the scenario that exposed the performance gap between the old and new foil configurations.

Blueshift's crew came out on top of it all. The full podium and race-by-race breakdown are pending confirmation from the ETF26 Series race office, but the title itself is not in question. For Demesmaeke, Dorange, and Rosengren, winning the first grand prix of the season under what amounts to a new technical era for the class sets a strong marker for what comes next on the 2026 circuit.

Photo credits: ETF26 Series - Mar Menor Grand Prix, Clément Gerbaud / Qaptur.