Santander City Trophy - Competition ready to launch

by Helena de la Gándara on 9 Sep 2013 For the Santander City Trophy, two Olympic classes and three categories (470 in male and female categories and Finn) will launch the competition and will release on Monday the race courses Alpha and Charlie -located in the Sardinero and Loredo/Somo-.

Each of the three categories that inaugurate the competition will run a total of 11 races through the week.

The week that everyone expected begins, with the fight for the Santander City Trophy, prior event to Santander 2014 ISAF World Championships. Everything is ready, the participants prepared and all classes are making final checks both in the water and on land, meanwhile the inscription registration process ends.

The 470 classes, in male and female categories, and Finn, male category, will be the first ones to use the scoreboards of the competition in the first of the seven games scheduled in the Santander City Trophy. On Tuesday, the sailors of RS: X, male and female, the 49er, 49er females of FX and the Nacra mixed crews will join the competition.

The Finn class will sail with 10 participants, representing Brazil, Bulgaria, Spain and Russia (with two boats per country), Germany, New Zealand, Slovenia and Sweden. It is worth mentioning the presence of Slovenian Vasilij Zbogar, (silver medal in the Olympic Games in Beijing in the Laser class) ranking number 10 in the world and European champions of the class, along with the number 15-ranked the New Zealander Josh Junior that throughout the year is making some impressive results.

The 470 class male will be the largest of the three classes beginning on Monday, with 35 registered representing Angola, Austria (two units), Belgium, Denmark, Spain (with a presence of nine boats), Finland (2) France (2), Great Britain, Germany (3), Israel, Japan, Portugal ( 3) Russia (2), Singapore, Switzerland, Sweden (2), Turkey and the United States.

The 470 –men- promises to give a great show both for the number of entries as for its quality. Among participants stand out the British shipmaster, Silver in the Olympic Games in London, Like Patience who teams with Joe Glanfield in Santander. The best international ranking crews will also battle for the Santander City Trophy: the Austrians Matthias Schmid and Florian Reichstädter (number two in the world), the French Sofian Bouvet and Jeremie Mion (number four in the world) or the Austrian tandem David Bargehr and Lukas Mähr (ranking fifth in the world).

Spain will have nine teams in search of victory and will also count with the World Champion of the J80 class Rayco Tabares-in tandem with Alfredo Gonzalez-that counts with a great knowledge of the Santander course, since in its waters he won the J80 world championship in 2009.

The 470 female category arrive to Santander with 18 units registered from 15 countries: Austria, Brazil, Czech Republic, Spain, France, Great Britain, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Switzerland, Sweden, Ukraine and United States.

The group of inscribed in the female category is spectacular, with four tops of the world ranking at stake for the title: the Austrians Lara Valdau and Jolanta Katarzyna (number one ranking), the British Sophie Wegelin and Eilidh McIntyre (number three) or the Americans Annie Haeger and Briana Provancha (number four). Besides these, the Brazilian Olympic medal Isabel Swan (Bronce in Beijing 2008) will measure forces with the British gold medal at London 2012 Hannah Mills and Saskia Clark or the also gold medal(in Elliot class) in London, Angela Pumariega and that will certainly draw on its extensive knowledge of the course and conditions of Santander.

Starting Tuesday we will be able to see in action more Olympic classes. That day the RS : X male and female, the 49er and 49er FX will join the game.

With the first races, the race courses of Santander’s cove Alpha and Charlie will be used for the first time (at the Sardinero area Loredo / Somo). The appointment will be from 13.00 hours with trapezoid format races and two races scheduled for the day, to a maximum of 11 to be held throughout the week.

The City Santander Trophy continues the ambitious program born from the Perth Olympic classes Championship in 2011. The sports training program in countries without sufficient resources or without sporting heritage has made that 11 boys and seven girls from 14 different countries be cited in Santander to dispute the Santander City Trophy and next year go to Santander 2014 ISAF World Championships.

Unlike other competing teams, all members of the multicultural program these days reside in the CEAR de Vela Principe Felipe and count with Spanish coaches scattered in different Olympic Event website