Alinghi 1st after day 1 in Cowes

24 June, 2015

The second round of the GC32 Bullitt Tour got off to a great start today in Cowes, that most iconic of sailing venues. Six races were sailed, with the spoils shared pretty evenly among the five teams. That has left the leaderboard particularly tight: Alinghi are in first, but scores are really tight, only three points separate us from the fourth.

It was a glorious day, with the sun shining down over the Solent. Winds were relatively light, albeit building over the course of the afternoon, but the racing was fascinating nonetheless. Race 1 went to Sultanate of Oman, who narrowly beat Alinghi to the finish line after a great duel between the two. The next race saw Alinghi have its revenge, taking first place ahead of its Omani rivals. This was Ernesto Bertarelli’s first win on the GC32 circuit and afterwards he was delighted:

“It’s such great fun racing these boats, especially when we get up on the foils. As we always knew it would be, the competition is tough, but we wouldn’t have it any other way. I think you can see in the way that the wins were spread across a number of teams that this event could be anybody’s. With it being so close, there’s all to play for. Roll on tomorrow…”

The remaining races went to Armin, Wave, Team Engie and Armin again, meaning that the leaderboard reads:

  1. Alinghi (14 points)
  2. Armin Strom Sailing Team (15 points)
  3. Team ENGIE (16 points)
  4. Sultanate of Oman (17 points)
  5. Team Argo (29 points)

Highlight of Day 1

Racing starts tomorrow at 11:00AM GMT – follow it live at www.gc32racing.com

Pictures credit: Sander van der Borch/Bullitt GC32 Racing Tour