RC44 Cagliari Cup

The Mistral was in again today as expected. The race committee announced this morning that they would only attempt two races and that is what we got in. The first races featured 18-23 knots of wind, while the wind came up to 25 knots for the second race and even 28 knots at the finish.

Artemis Racing and Katusha both had good races today demonstrating consistency. Artemis finished 5, 5 and Katusha finished 6, 6. Artemis was in second place for most of the first race but suffered a broach half way down the last run and lost a few places. Artemis Racing’s Chairman, Torbjorn Tornqvist is a good strong wind sailor and had their boat going fast all day. Gennadi is doing a great job on Katusha considering he has been sailing for just over a year now. The conditions in the second race got to the upper edge of controlability and Genaddi never lost control of the boat while many others did.

Actually, it wasn’t just Artemis and Katusha who demonstrated consistency today. All boats in the top six finished in the same position in both of todays races.

TeamAqua won both races today with excellent speed and tactics. ORACLE Racing was just behind with 2, 2. Ceeref followed with 3, 3 and Islas Canarias Puerto Calero had the double 4’s.

Racing continues tomorrow and the Mistral is expected to hold again. Sunday is expected to bring lighter winds.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com

Paul

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RC44 Cagliari Cup

Another great day for Artemis Racing/Katusha. It was a full 25 knot mistral on the race course and two races of the planned three races were held as most of the newer boats in the fleet suffered some sort of damage. The fleet has now grown to 15 boats which makes for very interesting and exciting racing.

Katusha, with owner Gennadi Timchenko driving for the first time since last October, has a 2, 6 in the windy conditions. After a great start at the committee boat, we were actually leading for a short time in the first race. TeamAqua sailed very well and passed us up the second windward leg. Still, we were very happy with the second place.

In the second race Katusha got to the first windward mark in 5th place but our bowsprit broke on the first run and we lost a few boats. Up the second windward leg, we passed two boats back while our crew jury rigged our bowsprit. We hung on down the final run to finish 6th. Very good job by our crew.

Artemis Racing meanwhile sailed very consistently finishing 4, 3. Torbjorn Tornqvist is very experienced at sailing in the strong winds of Cagliari and it showed today.

TeamAqua’s performance of 1, 4 showed that keeping the team together for so many years is valuable. Danny Calero sailed his Puerto Calero very fast as well, getting a 3, 2 and ending the day tied with TeamAqua for the top spot.

The forecast for tomorrow is continued mistral. Hopefully, it won’t be too strong. Racing continues through Sunday.

For complete results go to; www.rc44.com

Paul

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RC44 Cagliari Cup

Great day for Artemis Racing. Both Artemis and Katusha won all their matches today, four wins for Katusha and three for Artemis. This puts Katusha in a tie with TeamAqua for first place at this event and Artemis in a tie with ORACLE for third place. Not sure at this time how the ties will be broken.

The are now 15 boats in the fleet, so five boats sit out any given flight of races while ten battle.

The wind today was a mild Southeasterly that never built over 12 knots and softened in the afternoon. Nothing too spectacular to report. We were a little rusty on Katusha in the first match but were lucky enough to win and get better as the day went on.

Tomorrow a Mistral is forecast to arrive and last for three days. The Mistral brings 20-30 knots of wind from the Northwest. This should make for exciting sailing with 15 of these RC44s on a short course.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com

Paul

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Bol d’Or

Geneva,

It was a pretty fast race this year as a strong south westerly breeze pushed the fastest boats, the D35’s down to the east end of the lake in 2,5 hours, right on record time. However the way back was slower as the wind died in a few spots.

Over 500 boats started this classic lake geneva race on four different staring lines.

Alinghi led the D35 class early and won the race while being challenged by Foncia most of the way. There was a bit of shuffling but not huge parking lots.

On board Artemis Racing we did not do well at all, beating just one boat in our class. We did not sail particularly fast nor the right way in a few key moments.

At the east end of the lake the wind came up to 22 knots and the waves were about 1 meter. That is a difficult sea way in these light air machines. We dug the bow in pretty hard a couple of times.

Now there is a summer break for the D35 racing and the last two regattas of the season will be in the south of France, the first one the first weekend of September.

For complete results go to www.Vulcaintrophy.com

Paul

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D35 Sogeti Cup

Geneva,

Artemis Racing had two excellent scores in the first two races of the day with a 2, 4 and had taken the lead in the regatta.

At the first mark of the third race, Okalys, crashed into us while on port tack and that ended our day. As we were on starboard tack, we applied to the jury for redress and it was granted. The jury has quite wide discretion as to how they award redress. They could have averaged our points of the regatta to that point, discarding the worst score as that was how the scoring was done at that point. We would have been awarded 2.6 points per race in that case. The other extreme was to award us the average of all our scores including the discarded race. That would have resulted in 3.8 points per race. They chose the later and we finished second for the weekend.

With four regattas now complete, Artemis Racing is tied for second place with Volti Group in the D35 season championship with Focia winning. This being our first season in the class, we have to be pretty happy with that!

Next Saturday is the Bol d’Or, the race that will start in Geneva, take the fleet to Montreux at the opposite end of the lake some 50 miles away and back to Geneva.

This race can take anywhere for 5 to 25 hours. Drifting for hours followed by thunder squalls is not uncommon. Boats leading the entire race and then falling out of the wind 1 mile from the finish is also not uncommon. It will be my first Bol d’Or and it should be interesting.

For complete results go to www.vulcaintrophy.com

Paul

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D35 Sogeti Cup

Geneva, Switzerland

I did not realize that yesterday’s Geneve-Rolle-Geneve was a stand alone race and counts in the season championship as a regatta, same value as the first two regattas were we finished 3rd and 5th respectively. So after yesterday’s 2nd place, Artemis Racing was tied for first place in the season with Foncia and Velti Group. That was pleasant news but there is still a long way to go for the season.

Today was the first day of the Sogeti Cup. The wind was very light on Lake Geneva and only two races were held. Onboard Artemis Racing we managed a 2, 7 and are in 3rd place on the leader board for the Sogeti Cup, 2 points behind Okalys and Velti Group.

The winds were 6 knots max and mostly 3-4 knots. Still the D35s sail at twice the wind speed so the racing is fast and fun. Torbjorn continues to enjoy the catamaran sailing and is learning fast.

Tomorrow racing continues at 1300.

For complete results go to www.vulcaintrophy.com

Paul

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D-35 Geneve-Rolle-Geneve

Geneva

Great day for Artemis Racing today on Lake Geneva. With Torbjorn Tornqvist at the helm, we finished second in the 28 mile “offshore” race known as the “Geneve-Rolle-Geneve”. 300 boats participated in the classic which has taken place for more than 60 years. The starting line was 1 mile long and divided into three parts to spread the fleet.

There was less than 2 knots of wind at the start and the fleet made slow progress during the first hour. Foncia, with Michele Desjoyeaux at the helm, took the lead early and never relinquished it. Lady Cat of Donna Bertarelli was up at the front for the first half of the race along with Julius.

But it was the run back to Geneva that proved to be decisive. Yvan Ravussin, headsail trimmer onboard Artemis Racing, called for sticking close to the western shore on the return and this prove to be a winning move. Yvan has lived and raced his whole life on Lake Geneva and knows the winds as well as anyone. Yvan is also the world speed record holder for sailing as part of the Banque Popular crew that set the record of 908 miles in 24 hours a few years ago while setting the transatlantic record at 3 days 15 hours.

On the run back, the wind built to 11 knots and we were hitting 21 knots of boat speed. Torbjorn’s was not able to hide his grin and that was before we passed 8 boats to finish second! Todays race had a 1.5 factor which is nice.

Tomorrow and Monday, racing continues in front of Geneva with windward leeward courses, up to four races per day.

For complete results go to www.vulcaintrophy.com

Paul

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Realstone Cup – D-35

Crans, Switzerland

A pessimistic forecast gave way to the best day of wind here in Crans for the Realstone Cup. Foncia, who finished 8th I believe in the first event two weeks ago, won this event easily.

4 races were held today in winds varying from south to north and 3 knots to 15 knots. Thats racing on these lakes.

Onboard Artemis Racing our finishes for the weekend were 5, 5, 6, 3, 4. Very consistent but just not high enough up for the win. We finished 4th equal with Alinghi but lost the tie breaker to finish 5th overall. The placing’s were very tight at the end. At one point, just prior to the 3rd race, the wind came up to a solid 15 16 knots. I got my first taste of being scared in this boat. Bearing away is a scary moment as the leeward bow wants to dig in and cartwheel the boat. We avoided that but it was “hot” as the French onboard say.

We are continuing to get to know our boat, SWE 12, and the class. We have a little problem upwind against the fleet but we are very fast downwind. We will work to improve our upwind speed.

For complete results go to www.vulcaintrophy.com

Back to SF tomorrow morning for some meetings with ACRM and the other AC competitors.

Paul

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Realstone Cup – D-35

Crans, Switzerland

Today was the first day of racing for the D-35 fleet in the second event of the season, the Realstone Grand Prix d Crans. Unfortunately the wind was almost non existent but we did manage to have one race in very light conditions of 6 knots dropping to 4 at the finish. Onboard Artemis Racing with Torbjorn Tornqvist at the helm, we managed a 5th place out of 10 teams competing. Pretty good for Torbjorn’s first multihull race! He was very happy with that and it is great to see him getting involved first hand in multihull racing since the Cup will be in Cats and he is obviously very passionate and committed to our America’s Cup campaign.

Alinghi continued their strong performance from the last event with a win today while the winners from two weeks ago, C.E.R finished just behind us in 6th today.

The forecast for tomorrow isn’t very good…light winds with the addition of rain possible.

For complete results go to www.vulcaintrophy.com

I spent last week in Valencia with our team. We had some very good sailor/design team meetings discussing the design of our AC72, deck layouts, etc. Terry Hutchinson and his crew of Rodney Ardern, Morgan Trubovich are on their way to Istanbul today for the Extreme 40 event there next week. Julien Cressant, who is sailing with us here in Switzerland on the D-35, will join them Monday to complete the X-40 crew.

Lots going on….always.

Paul

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RC44 Austria

One race here in Austria on the final day for the RC44 fleet. It was a rainy and cold day….temperature about 10C. It hailed at one point.

Oracle Racing continued their dominance of the event by winning the only race of the day. Onboard Katusha, we had our worst race of the event finishing 10th and finished up 6th overall. For sure it has been a frustrating three days since our good start last Thursday. Lake Traunsee is always an extremely tricky venue and this year I did not do a good job of figuring it out.

Artemis had a tough regatta and finished 11th.

Oracle Racing with Russell Coutts as tactician really did a great job and always seemed to be in the right place at the right time and that was quite a feat considering the wind was shifting 90 degrees regularly and 150 degrees at times.

Aqua, a brand new boat for this event got on form also in the last couple of days to finish second.

We are looking forward to the next event in Cagliari, Sardinia June 28-July 3.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com

Paul

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