Sardinia Cup: Favourites in front at the start, strong wind long distance ahead

After a 14-year break, the Range Rover Sardinia Cup is celebrating its comeback. This also brings back many memories of the golden age of sailing in Germany. GER teams often played a strong role in the Italian version of the British Admiral's Cup. They won three times. The first time was one year after the second German Admiral's Cup victory in 1984 with Willy Illbruck's "Pinta", Hans-Otto Schümann's "Rubin" and Udo Schütz's "Container".

Sardinia Cup: German teams win three times

Four years later, "Rubin", "Container 88" and Albert Bülls "Saudade" were successful together for black, red and gold in 1988. Most recently, Wolfgang Schäfer's "Struntje Light" and "Teasing Machine" won under the German flag in the then already active two-boat format. The Italians themselves are the record winners with seven victories between the Sardinia Cup premiere in 1978 and the last edition in 2012, which Team USA won with "Quantum Racing" and the Iberdrola Team.

Like last year's Admiral's Cup, this summer has also seen the rebirth of the Italian Team Summit with its colourful history. A strong international field of participants motivates. 20 boats in ten teams lined up for the first middle distance on Tuesday. The results lists then showed two co-favourites at the front.

The teams from the Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) and the host Yacht Club Costa Smeralda (YCCS) are tied at the top of the standings after the first test of strength. As in the Admiral's Cup, the Italians have once again chosen a format with two-boat teams for the revival of their former regatta jewel. The duos each compete with one boat in Sardinia Cup Class 1 (SC1) and one in Sardinia Cup Class 2 (SC2).

Two fleets, 20 boats, 10 teams in the new Sardinia Cup

The opening offshore regatta on Tuesday took the fleet over a distance of around 30 nautical miles for the SC1 boats and 22.5 nautical miles for the SC2 challengers. The route chosen by the race organisers took the yachts in the Maddalena archipelago through the Passo delle Bisce to the island of Spargi. There, the larger boats circumnavigated the island clockwise in the Strait of Bonifacio before heading back to Porto Cervo on a semi-windward leg. This time, the Tre Monti shallows had to be left on the port side before passing through the Passo delle Bisce again.

Meanwhile, the SC2 fleet rounded a mark off Spargi before returning to the finish off Porto Cervo on the same route. In a light mistral of around 10 to 12 knots, the fleet sailed upwind towards the Passo delle Bisce, with most of the SC1 participants choosing the favoured left-hand side of the course. At the same time, many of the SC2 boats quickly broke away from the field in order to find free wind in the centre of the course.

Throughout the cruise to Spargi, the tacticians were busy looking for the best wind pressure like gold in the Maddalena archipelago, while the navigators had the task of navigating cleanly around the rocks and shoals close to the coast, which the SC2 boats in particular came quite close to. The mistral freshened to around 14 knots in the northern part of the race course. The SC1 boats also reported gusts of up to 16 knots at Spargi.

Bayern team in sixth place at the start

The German duo with Carl-Peter Forster's TP 52 "Red Bandit" (6th in SC1) and Sascha Schröder's Neo Roma 430 "Neomind" (9th in SC2) are in sixth place after the middle distance. The team is competing in the Sardinia Cup under the umbrella of the Bavarian Yacht Club. The first laurels, however, went to others in the Italian dream area. James Neville's TP 52 "Ino Veritas" won SC1 ahead of Giovanni Lombardi Stronati's Wallyrocket 51 "Django WR", already familiar from the Admiral's Cup.

The crew on the IRC 52 "Jolt 3" had a great battle with the race winner "Ino Veritas" on the middle course. This could have brought "Jolt 3" second place had it not been for an annoying penalty. Roberto Lacorte's Wallyrocket 51 "RocketNikka" took third place at the start of the Sardinia Cup. Click here for the individual results for the SC1 class.

In SC2, Niklas Zennström's IRC 41 "Ran" won the race for her team from the Royal Ocean Racing Club. At the finish, he finished 51 seconds ahead of Lombardo Stronati's Botin Fast+ "Django JP" from the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda team. The Estonian Carkeek 40 MK2 GP "Nola" took third place for the Yacht Club Repubblica Marinara di Pisa. Click here for the individual results for the SC2 class.

After the first day of racing, the Royal Ocean Racing Club and the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda share the lead in the Range Rover Sardinia Cup with five points each. The sister team Royal Ocean Racing Club Gold was initially in bronze place with 6.3 points. The two German boats "Red Bandit" and "Neomind" have collected 15 points. There is still time to advance until 7 June. Click here for the interim results of the team ranking.

Sardinia Cup: Power long distance ahead

After the long distance race over 130 nautical miles, which is scheduled to start on Wednesday afternoon at 3 pm, further short races and coastals will follow over three days. Regarding the upcoming overnight race, "Red Bandit" Moriz Forster, whose team was still carrying out tests on Wednesday morning, said: "We are expecting 35 knots of wind. It will be a fast long distance."

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