RC44 Championship Tour, Team Aquq grabs the win from the jaws of defeat

Sotogrande – After two severe days, Sotogrande and the Andalusian coastline laid on perfect conditions for the final day of competition at the RC44 Sotogrande Cup. Mountainous seas gave way to a short chop, torrential rain gave way to brilliant sunshine and a stiff but shifty 20 knot, westerly offshore wind, to provide the tacticians with some welcome head scratching.

Despite this idyllic scenario for the crews and a tight leaderboard to resolve, the day was formidably taxing for PRO Peter Reggio and team as the wind repeatedly shifted causing numerous general recalls. It also proved treacherous for the crews with numerous ‘hero to zero’ moments across the fleet. None was worse than that of Team Aqua.

Having increased their lead to five points after the first race, Team Aqua were on track to consolidate their position in the second race until they caught a decent sized wave that buried the bow breaking the bowsprit. The crew rallied to fit a replacement just before the shut-off for the final race of the day.

In this, amazingly, the three frontrunners were last to the weather mark. At the second weather mark rounding Team Aqua had recovered fourth place, which they hung on to the finish. winning them the RC44 Sotogrande Cup title while Peninsula Petroleum, which came home last, took second overall.

Kirill Frolov, joint helmsman on Bronenosec Sailing Team rounded-up the Sotogrande Cup podium in third, a fine result considering it was their first regatta with an almost entirely new crew.

Results.

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