No racing today. Too much wind. Better forecast for tomorrow.

Unfortunately, our owner and helmsman Guenaddi had to leave tonight for a work appointment tomorrow so he won’t be here for racing tomorrow. We will have a replacement helmsman, also from Russia, Maxim Logutenko.

Gala dinner tonight for the teams. 1030 start tomorrow.

Paul

Well, that makes two of the worst days of sailing in my career. Today, we did not do much better than yesterday, despite fully debriefing yesterday and really focusing on what we were doing.

We did manage to win the friendly rivalry match we have with Cereef today, where the skipper is Rod Davis. Rod is a long time friend of mine and there is always a case of beer on the line. In the others, we seemed to be a bit slow but after winning against Cereef, i think there was a lot more to the difference in pressure out there than what it appeared. Because the conditions were quite light today, the boats split farther apart so the wind speed differentials made the difference. In the Artemis race, we were over the starting line early so we just gave that one away right there. Somehow, we managed to stay out of the cellar thanks to Puerto Calero.

Anyway, I am banking on the thought that this will be water under the bridge shortly. As bad a day possible out here, it is still a great place to be. I know a lot of people would trade places with me in a heartbeat so I am grateful for the job I have even on a very tough day!

Tomorrow is a practice day for the fleet racing and our owner Guennadi is coming into town tomorrow from the South of France. The weather here is not like the South of France so I told him to bring some warm clothes. Forecast for later this week is 20-30 knots of wind. Should be exciting for Guennadi since this will be his second time steering a boat ever.

No report tomorrow, but I will pick it up again on Friday night.

For complete results go to www.RC44.com

Paul

Gmunden-

The wind came back to Lake Traunsee today and racing got underway on time at 1130. Race officer Peter Reggio got four races in again.

BMW Oracle continued to show dominance with both of their boats tied for first place in the fleet racing. No way back, last year’s overall winner, finished third. Onboard Katusha, with owner Guennadi Timtchenko at the helm for his first sailing ever, we were very pleased to finish the fleet racing in 8th place. We even finished second in one race today! This combined with our third place from the Match Racing puts us 5th overall for regatta. Guennadi was ecstatic. I think there is a fair chance he is hooked.

I am off to Portofino tomorrow for the Nespresso Cup. This should be a fun event with about 14 very large sailboats from the Wally Class. I think I am to sail on a different boat each day.

Following Portofino, I will be going to Cascais, Portugal for the Audi MedCup TP52 event there.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com

Paul

Gmunden-

Today was the first day of fleet racing here in Austria. After torrential rains last night, the wind was slow to get going but finally around 1400 we got the first race of the day started.

As you probably know, the RC 44 is an “owner driver” class in the fleet racing. Our owner, Gennady Timchenko, has not been able to attend any of the three previous regattas onboard Katusha. But he has come to Austria and he was our helmsman today. What is impressive about this is that today was his third day sailing ever. Yesterday, the practice day was the first time he ever steered a boat. The RC 44 is a Ferrari of boats and the fleet is very competitive, so you can imagine what a stressful day it would be for a novice sailor to be steering one of these boats in a 10 boat fleet race.

Anyway, Gennady did great today. We didn’t finish last in any of the four races and in fact we are in 9th place in the fleet racing after the first day. He had a smile on his face despite receiving plenty of suggestions all day long. The racing on the lake is plenty shifty, so there are always opportunities to come back and there was plenty of mixing out there.

Cereef who started off with a last place in the first race ended up winning the 3rd and 4th races. Larry Ellison’s BMW Oracle has maintained their top form from the match racing and are leading the fleet racing at this point.

Tomorrow’s forecast is for more rain and less wind. But things tend to change fast around here, so we will see what we get when we wake up.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com

Gmunden-

It was a picture perfect day on Lake Traunsee today, one to remember I think as the forecast for the weekend is not so nice. Today was clear blue skies and a nice 8-12 knots breeze filled in on the south part of the lake at 1130 so racing got underway right on time.

Seven flights were held today and the big winner was Larry Ellison with Russell Coutts on tactics. They won 5 of their 6 races, with their only loss to Katusha. They even beat their sister team, RC 44 Challenge, with the America?s Cup winners James Spithill on the wheel and John Kostecki calling the shots.

Onboard Katusha, we had a decent day with three wins and two loses. We had a problem with the battens in our mainsail in the first two races and felt this was hurting our speed upwind. We changed them after the second race and then lost to Artemis in a close battle. Then we won the last two races against BMW Oracle and Cereef. We had a bye in the last race of the day so we have one more race to sail tomorrow than most of the teams.

There are four flights tomorrow and we will race, Team Aqua, RC 44 Challenge, No Way Back and Puerto Calero.

The forecast for tomorrow is similar to today. Tomorrow night a front is supposed to come through and the temperatures are to drop drastically. It snowed here last race in this event, so we are getting the warm clothes and ski hats ready.

For complete results go to www.rc44.com