Copa del Rey Mapfre - Third overall for Robertissima

by Paul Cayard on 10 Aug 2014 The short story is that we finished second in today's race, and third for the Copa del Rey Mapfre in Palma.

The longer story is that the wind filled in so late that only one race was possible. When it filled it was the windiest of the week, at 18 knots.

On Robertissima, we had a great start and controlled the race, leading at very mark including the finish.

Bella Mente and Jethou both had bad starts, went right and was quite far behind after the first lap. Shockwave and Alegre sailed close to each other in second and third most of the race.

Heading into the last windward mark Alegre slipped back a bit and Shockwave slipped in right between us.

At that point we didn't have enough boats between us to win. At 22 Knots of boat speed the run only lasted 8 minutes.

We crossed first with Alegre second, Shockwave third and Bella Mente fourth.

As it was Shockwave won the regatta and even the race because the 25 seconds we beat them by wasn't enough. But we were tied with Bella Mente and would beat them on the tie breaker.

After the race Alegre retired and this moved Bella Mente up to third in the race and second overall. It was all a bit hard for is to understand but we later found out that Alegre had touched the windward mark.

Obviously we would have loved to have had the second race as we were going sailing well but we had passed the time for the last start for the day.

All in all, we improved all week. We worked on our speed and our starts. We won more races than anyone, just had too many bad ones as well.

We were quite a few new people to the team for this regatta as the 'regulars' were racing in the TP52 fleet. The next event for Robertissima is the Maxi Worlds in Porto Cervo in three weeks.

It was fun to be onboard Robertissima with a lot of friends.

For complete results, click here