“It’s the Mecca of kites”, “I go there every year on pilgrimage”. As soon as we mention Berck-sur-Mer, kite enthusiasts are unanimous: the seaside town of Pas-de-Calais has become a must in this universe. After two editions canceled due to Covid-19, International Kite Meetings make their big comeback on Berck beach, from April 23 to May 1. The biggest event of the year with at least 600,000 visitors in nine days and economic benefits running into the millions of euros, they were born almost by chance in 1987.
“That year, we celebrated the centenary of the first aerial photography taken by kite,” says Romain Roger, one of the organizers of the event. To mark the occasion, a group of enthusiasts gathered on the beach at Berck to fly a kite. Basically, it’s just a good-natured event between friends. But they came back the next year, then the year after, and the mayor at the time felt it would be good to make it a city-sponsored event. »
A sport that you cannot live on financially
Thirty-five years later, the bet has paid off as the kite is now associated with Berck-sur-Mer. For this 2022 vintage, more than 300 kite flyers of 18 different nationalities are expected both for exhibitions and also for competition. Among them is Benoît Flament. At 42, this Amiens is one of the leaders in the discipline. World champion, European champion and French champion, he won all possible kite titles with his sidekick Maxime Desavoye and their team. Start Air.
But do not believe that the kite flier made a fortune with his passion. If the kite is affiliated with the French Free Flight Federation, no competitor lives from it. Civil IT manager, Benoît Flament trains in his spare time: “You can’t live financially from kite flying as a competitor. But it is an outdoor sport that requires real physical preparation. If you’re not in good physical shape, you can’t perform a five-minute demonstration, it’s an intense effort”.
“Not everything we do in the air is improvised”
In competition mode, two events coexist: the precision one where the teams must perform compulsory figures and the so-called ballet one, where for five minutes, the kites perform a choreography to music chosen in advance. A millimeter work laid down on paper.
“Not everything we do in the air is improvised, insists Benoît Flament. It’s written on a kind of storyboard with small drawings and arrows to clearly determine who does what. Everything is written, prepared, nothing is improvised. We revise our figures before going on the ground and unrolling our kite lines. “As in figure skating, it is the judges who note the technique and the choreography to decide between the competitors.
Hand-sewn XXL kites
But in Berck, beyond the competition between the best in the world, there is also an exhibition part where enthusiasts can deploy their most beautiful kites on the two kilometer long beach. Each year, it is up to the one who will deploy the most beautiful, even the largest, to impress the public. At 60, Jean-Paul Maurin is one of those enthusiasts.
For 20 years, this computer graphics designer based in the Yonne has even specialized in the in-house manufacture of XXL kites. “I have kites that are between 100 and 200 m2. For example, I built a Nautilus kite, Jules Verne’s submarine, which is 22 meters long, 6 meters high and 6 meters wide. It corresponds to two buses, ”smiles the sixty-year-old.
The Odysseus of Ulysses 31 will be there
To build these behemoths, Jean-Paul Maurin needs a year to make the plans, model in 3D, buy spinnaker canvas, hand-sew his work of art before bridle (connecting the ropes of the deer- flying in a single point of balance) then to make it fly.
“I do about one a year depending on my inspiration”, develops the enthusiast who specializes in spaceships. This year, he has made the Odysseus, the ship of Ulysses 31, cartoon hero. A kite 8 meters in diameter which should still amaze a Berckois public delighted to find International Meetings conducive to magic.