The day after the halfway point of the Spanish classic Copa del Rey Mapfre, the cards are being redistributed. In the first half of the popular regatta week in the bay of Palma de Mallorca, the teams have already completed half of the races, but the results will be bundled and averaged as one race result in the overall standings to increase the suspense. A further six races are on the programme from Thursday to Saturday. Time enough for hunters like Marcus Brennecke's crew on "Hatari" to work their way up to the podium places.
In the fiercely contested single class of 50 swans, Leonardo Ferragamo's "Cuordileone" was in the lead at the halfway point, ahead of his compatriots on Andrea Lacorte's "Vitamina" and the German "Niramo" of Sönke Meier-Sawatzki. Marcus Brennecke's "Hatari" team is lurking in fourth place. Three years after its introduction, the format with a preliminary round with comparatively little weight for the overall result and the subsequent final series still has its fans, but also its opponents.
We're saving the best until the final" (Marcus Brennecke)
"Hatari" owner Marcus Brennecke laughs: "Last year at this time, we were fourth going into the final series and then won, so we're following the same strategy again and saving the best until the final. We had a good day at the end of the preliminary round on Wednesday. The first race was mediocre, it should have been a third or fourth place. But we stalled at the end, made a mistake and lost a few places just before the finish line. So we dropped back to sixth place in the race and lost some points. But we fought our way back and won the second race. Now we're in fourth place, which is okay."
On the whole, Brennecke says he prefers direct races, "maybe with two training days, but that makes a series like this a long week. In any case, it's holiday time now and I'm looking forward to the weekend when my daughter comes to us for her tenth birthday and sails with us.
If we sail well, we can make it to the front again" (Markus Wieser)
In the ClubSwan50 regattas, another important factor plays a role in the current performance in the hotly contested one-design class: the teams are only allowed to calibrate seven new sails per season. This makes the sails and their timing a tactical "weapon". While the "Hatari" crew is saving its new sails for the season highlight of the World Championship in October off Scarlino, Sönke Meier-Sawatzki's team is already sailing with fresh cloths off Palma.
"We just have to fight harder," said "Hatari" tactician Markus Wieser, describing the current task at the 41st edition of the Copa del Rey, "if we sail well now, we can make it back to the front." The German ClubSwan 50 racers were in third ("Niramo"), fourth ("Hatari"), sixth ("Earlybird"/Hendrik Brandis), seventh ("Xai Vision"/Enis Ersu) and eighth ("Olymp"/Markus Berner) before the start of the second half.
Francesco Mongelli, helmsman of the second-placed "Vitamina", also said in Palma that he was not a fan of the two-part regatta with a "devalued" preliminary round: "Personally, I don't like the format in its current form, for example, there shouldn't be six and six races, there could be three races in the first part of the first series." Markus Wieser interpreted the mood in Palma as "ripe for change": "It looks like the current format could be changed again for next year. It doesn't really make much sense and is not popular in our class."
In ORC Class 1, King Felipe and the crew of the Spanish Navy's TP52 "Aifos" have now claimed their second victory in a row and also triumphed in the 30 nautical mile coastal regatta. "Aifos" will start the final round from third place. In the largest ORC class, the German-Spanish ClubSwan 42 "Palibex-Elena Nova" of Javier Sanz and Christian Plump is in the lead. Their boat took fifth place in the coastal regatta and finished the preliminary series just half a point ahead of their Argentinian rivals on the Swan 45 "From Now On".
In the ORC 2 classification, the Spanish helmsman Basilo Marquinez and his crew are fighting for a podium place in second place overall after the preliminary round on the ClubSwan42 "Seabery Dralion" under the German flag. The Italian ClubSwan42 "Teatro del Soho - Caixabank" is in the lead here.
These impressions taken after two days of the 41st Copa del Rey Mapfre will put you in a good mood:
Tatjana Pokorny
Sports reporter
