44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Overall

While the penultimate day of racing at the 44Cup Marstand was cancelled due to excess wind, today conditions off the paradise Swedish island for the final three races were still boisterous, less due to the southwesterly wind being in the high teens, but from the lumpy residual sea state after Friday's gale.

After today's first race there was a three way tie at the top of the leaderboard between Nico Poons' Charisma, Pietro Loro Piana's Aleph Racing and Vladimir Prosikhin's 44Cup leader Team Nika. Going into the final race, Team Nika held a slender two point advantage over Aleph Racing with the top four of the 12 competitors still capable of winning.

44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Day 4 - photo © Nico Martinez / 44Cup

In the end Team Nika nearly lost it in the last race, recounted tactician Nic Asher: "We had a good start, we were in control. We rounded the top mark ahead, but then it unravelled: I overstood the bottom gate. Then on the next beat we just had a big fight with Aleph and they managed to just squeeze past us. And then luckily the guys did an amazing job on the last run and we managed to roll them and then get around them. I got saved by the team there, for sure. So much for it being a nice, easy race..."

Coming off a win in Porto Cervo in May, Team Nika now sits on five points to Team Charisma's eight on the 2025 44Cup leaderboard.

"Sometimes I suspect he works not for us!" quipped an otherwise delighted Team Nika owner Vladimir Proshikin of his tactician, adding that they had also endured a broach today. "It was a last minute win. It is very satisfying when you can do things like that. So it was a very good regatta and days like today are rare - from J3 to J2 and J3 again, waves from the side and going downwind. But it is why we love this class."

44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Day 4 - photo © Nico Martinez / 44Cup

Hosted in Marstrand by Artemis Technologies, the 44Cup traditionally has its substantial event dinner at this event in the island's Society House. And traditionally the winner of the first race of the day following this is Nico Poons' Team Charisma. The 'hangover cure' award again went to the Dutchman's team this year, when they won today's first race. "I think we should drink even more!" commented Poons, whose team has won here for the last three years and won today's opening race after making the best on the right of the first upwind.

Remarkably both today's second and third races were won by GeMera, skippered by Markus Törnqvist, helming for just his second ever 44Cup event with Francesco Bruni calling tactics. This resulted in GeMera being top scoring boat of the day, an exceptional result for the fledgling team.

44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Day 4 - photo © Nico Martinez / 44Cup

"It's a very unexpected result, because we did run into a few issues, especially boat handling ones," commented Markus Törnqvist. "A few of our takedowns were not the best. Otherwise our upwind speed tactics were spot on today. The crew is becoming less prone to mistakes, so I think that's a very positive development overall, and I'm very excited to see what we can do in the future." GeMera ended the event a worthy fourth, two points short of the podium.

The Törnqvists nearly concluded their event perfectly with a 1-2 in the final race, but instead posted a 1-3. Nonetheless Torbjörn Törnqvist was proud to have hosted the event yet again. "Obviously, this year we have had action. For the three days we raced, I think the crews found it extremely exciting and for me, personally, it's a pleasure to have everybody here." Artemis Racing's final day was curtailed by many of her crew being sick and having to be replaced with substitutes. However he was proud of son Markus's results, which he is also using for his own motivation: "I'm very proud of what he achieved. It's nice to see. I can't let them beat me that easily!"

44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Day 4 - photo © Nico Martinez / 44Cup

Black Star Sailing Team posted two strong results today, leading for the first lap of the last race. "We had nothing to lose so we tried the left side and it paid off," recounted skipper Christian Zuerrer. They also gained places by surfing into the finishes at pace in today's first and third races, including pipping Artemis Racing at the post to clam second in the latter. "You just have to be patient waiting for the waves and not try to catch them."

Trying the RC44 for the first time this week was Jan Scholtes and his Warp 5 team from the Netherlands. "It's been really, really exciting," Scholtes commented. "Today was a great day. We had it all - a penalty, the instruments dropped off so we had to do the last race completely on our feelings. And it went very well. The surfing was great today and we really enjoyed ourselves. I didn't really know what to expect, but the boat handled much better than I thought. It's so easy to feel, even in these big waves. It sails tremendously well."

44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Day 4 - photo © Nico Martinez / 44Cup

From here the 44Cup moves on to a new venue, Scheveningen in the Netherlands, hosted by Team Charisma's Nico Poons. This will serve as the class' World Championship before the event concludes in Marina Jandía on Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands in November. In the final tally for 2025, neither of these events will be discardable, upping the ante for both.

Overall Results: