Tuesday it was the turn of the J Class and Mini Maxi 1’s former Maxi 72s to sail windward-leewards on open water on day 2 of the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup.
Sailing two windward-leewards today were the four Js and it was again Svea, steered by a former two time Rolex Mini Maxi World Champion on these waters, Niklas Zennström, that prevailed to maintain the Swedish J’s perfect scoreline.
Under the J Class rule Svea finished 2 minutes 18 seconds ahead of Velsheada in the first race and 1 minutes 39 second in front of Topaz in the second.
Among the former Maxi 72s it was again the turn of the ‘less pimped’ examples to prevail – of the two races sailed Tuesday George Sakellaris’ Proteus won the first by 10 seconds on corrected time from Hap Fauth’s Bella Mente.
Monday’s winner, Jim Swartz’s peppermint-coloured Vesper, claimed the second and now leads Mini Maxi 1 by three points from Proteus with Dario Ferrari’s heavily modified Cannonball holding third.
Meanwhile all the other classes sailed a long windward-leeward, up and down Bomb Alley with the faster yachts rounding the island of Spargi, while the slower boats had a turning mark just south.
In the Super Maxi class that was another Swedish victory for Monday’s winner, the Swan 115 Shamanna, her time correcting out to 1 minutes 2 seconds ahead of the Spirit Yachts 111 Geist.
Meanwhile in the largest class competing, the 13-strong Maxi class, there was upset . . .
Initially it appeared that Claus Peter Offen’s Wally 100 Y3K had won, only to lose out to Massimiliano Florio’s Southern Wind 82 Grande Orazio following a protest over a start line infringement.
Nonetheless Y3K won the unofficial ‘battle of the 100s’ of which there are five racing here.
The tightest leaderboard after two days is in Mini Maxi 2 where one point separates yesterday’s leader, Sven Wackerhagen’s Wally 80 Rose, from Alessandro Del Bono’s ILC maxi Capricorno and Luciano Gandini’s Mylius 80 Twin Soul B, winner of last year’s 151 Miglia-Trofeo Cetilar.
The jet black Twin Soul B seems equally comfortable inshore as she won Wednesday’s race.
There was a repeat winner too in the combined Mini Maxi 3 and 4 class where again it was the turn of the regal-looking silver Vallicelli 78 H20 of Riccardo de Michele to come out on top.
However on the ascent is the 1976 vintage Swan 65 ketch Shirlaf of Guiseppe Puttini, which now lies second overall, one point ahead of Luca Scoppa’s Dehler 60 Blue Oyster, having finished second.
Roberto Lacorte and FlyingNikka sailed the correct course today and having set off last achieved their ambition to sail up the fleet to finish in the middle of the Maxi class (which started 45 minutes before them).
Wednesday the wind is forecast to be from the southwest and slightly lighter than today. The Maxi class is scheduled to race windward-leewards with everyone else on coastal courses.
