MedCup Region of Sardinia Trophy 2011 - Hard times for Azzurra

by Giuliano Luzzatto on 22 Jul 2011 Audi MedCup Region of Sardinia Trophy 2011 has resulted in a negative day for Audi Azzurra who finished towards the back of the fleet in both races. Despite these difficulties, Azzurra Sailing Team maintains their third place in the Audi MedCup overall classification.

This is sailing: some days fate is against you and the more you do the less you achieve. The Audi Azzurra Sailing Team crew is made up, however, of professional sailors who will no doubt learn valuable lessons from this decidedly negative day.

Strategist Vasco Vascotto spoke on behalf of the team on his return to shore: 'We must learn from our mistakes, which are costing us dearly. We sailed badly and we regret that, but we can do better than these performances. We feel we can recover, the gap from first place is 10 points. We will see the results at the end of the week, for now we need to concentrate on doing well tomorrow.'

In the first race Azzurra started well and rounded the first windward mark in fourth place, just a few seconds from the leaders. During the following downwind leg Azzurra sailed in areas of the course less favoured by the Mistral gusts of up to 20 knots. The crew stayed focused and chose the right side of the course to move up to third place.

The wind remained unstable, however, and Azzurra was forced back down the fleet and finished sixth. Synergy won the race followed by Quantum and Audi All4One. The second race saw Azzurra trailing from the start and despite all efforts the team did not manage to get back into the race. A photo finish was won by Quantum ahead of Synergy and Audi Azzurra website