June 6, 2025 
“I think we know the formula… we just need one of the Wachmans in our team,” Duarte Seabra of the St. Tropez Pirates told GCTV on Thursday.
The Pirates snatched victory in the CSI5* Global Champions League leg in Cannes by a mere 1.36 seconds, relegating the home-team Cannes Stars to second under the Riviera lights. Just two weeks prior in Madrid, Spain, the Pirates jumped to their first podium of the 2025 GCL season, finishing third.
“Last time in Madrid we had Tom, and this week we had Max… so it doesn’t matter which one—I think that’s the key now to a podium!” said Seabra.
All three podium teams entered Round 2 in Cannes on zero faults. The Pirates’ Max Wachman (Fancy de Kergane) and Mariano Martinez Bastida (Jup) delivered flawless first rounds, while substitute Seabra (Dourados 2) clinched the win with a lightning-fast clear despite Bastida’s two late rails. Their 8-fault total edged out the Cannes Stars’ 153.38-second time.
But there may be more to his ‘Wachman’ theory than Seabra realized.
A day later and some 740 miles north in France, a Wachman was yet again riding on a winning team. This time for Ireland and in the Nations Cup of La Baule.
Tom Wachman and Tabasco de Toxandria Z delivered a clutch clear in the Round 2 to clinch the win for the Irish on a team total of zero, alongside teammates Bertram Allen (Qonquest de Rigo), Seamus Hughes Kennedy (ESI Rocky) and Cian O’Connor (Bentley de Sury). And, like the CSIO4* Nations Cup the week prior at Thunderbird Show Park, the dominating Irish didn’t need field their fourth rider. Their victory was already confirmed.
It’s the second Irish Nations Cup win in as many weeks and third of the 2025 season. (They also won the Longines League of Nations (LLN) opener in Abu Dhabi on a team total of zero. Albeit without a Wachman.)
To put that stellar few weeks in context, the Wachmans are barely old enough to drink the champagne they’re spilling on podiums. Tom is 20. Max is 21.
With the St Tropez home leg next week, the Pirates aim to ride their momentum—and maybe summon another Wachman—to close the gap. The Irish team will next contest leg three of the LLN in Rotterdam on June 20.
