TP52's Cascais Azzurra - Two strong finishes

by Giuliano Luzzatto on 18 Sep 2015 With two second place finishes today, Azzurra, the boat flying the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda’s burgee, is holding on to her leadership overall in the 52 Super Series 2015 and is just three points behind the current Cascais Cup leader: the American team aboard Quantum Racing.

The Cascais Cup, the final event in the 52 Super Series, saw a windward/leeward race today followed by a short coastal race of about 15 nm that took the boats along the spectacular rocky coastline up to the lighthouse at Cabo Raso. Light winds were from the northwest at about eight knots, but over the course of the day strengthened to about 13 knots while the sea state diminished to about two mt from yesterday’s four mt. With two second place finishes Azzurra is just behind Quantum, who got back to back wins today. The two teams are currently separated by just three points in the Cascais Cup but Azzurra’s overall Series lead is still 32 points. Provezza and Vesper placed third and fourth respectively in the first race while Spookie, with two eighth place finishes today, did not manage to repeat yesterday’s performance.

If the first race of the day was characterized by a strong wind shift to the right immediately after the start- conditions that favored boats that were on that side of the course and penalized others, the coastal race was more interesting and hard fought. There were constant changes of positions across the fleet except for Quantum, who held on to her lead from the start. Azzurra fought hard to hold off Platoon and Vesper who alternated in second place. The YCCS’s boat rounded the mark off Cabo Raso in third place behind Vesper, but managed to recover in the downwind leg heading back to Cascais thanks to a well-executed attack.

Tomorrow the starting signal is scheduled for 1:00 PM local time, 2:00 PM CEST time.

Guillermo Parada, skipper: “It was a very good day for us, we had two very good results and we’re happy. We finished second in both races and are holding on to our overall Series advantage with two races less to go. Plus we are second in this event at just three points from the leader here in Cascais. So it’s almost time to start thinking about winning this regatta also. But first we have to finish the big part of the job which is winning the Series, then we can start thinking about Cascais too.”

Grant Lorenz, trimmer: “It was a good day for Azzurra, we had to fight in the coastal race to fight out way back into second place. The boys put in a good effort, we started well and the boat was going well and two second places is good enough to keep it close with Quantum. We’re still ahead of them and we’ll see what happens tomorrow.”

Vasco Vascotto, tactician: “Today I’m really happy. We sailed well without forcing our hand, waiting for the right time to pass other boats. Yesterday we let Quantum get a point closer to us and I was sorry about that. Strangely enough, today they got two points on us and I’m happy. I’m feeling good because we sailed well and we gave them a hard time. We just couldn’t catch them and they deserved their wins.”

52 Super Series - Cascais Cup after four races
1. Quantum Racing, (Doug DeVos USA) (3,3,1,1) 8 puntos
2. Azzurra, ITA (Pablo/Alberto Roemmers ARG) (5,2,2,2) 11 pts.
3. Vesper (Jim Swartz USA) (1,6,4,3) 14 pts.
4. Spookie, (Steve Benjamin USA) (2,1,8,8) 19 pts.
5. Platoon, (Harm Müller-Spreer GER) (4,5,7,6) 22 pts.
6. Provezza, (Ergin Imre TUR) (9,4,3,9) 25 pts.
7. Sled, USA (Takashi Okura JPN) (7,8,9,5) 29 pts.
8. Bronenosec, (Vladimir Liubomirov RUS) (6,9,6,10) 31 pts.
9. Alegre, GBR (Andres Soriano USA) (12,10,11,4) 37 pts.
10. Paprec (Jean-Luc Petithuguenin FRA) (10,11,10,7) 38 pts.
11. Xio/Hurakan, (Marco Serafini ITA) (11,12,5,11) 39 pts.
12. Gladiator, (Tony Langley GBR) (8,7,12,12) 39 pts.