 Dean Barker looking to get himself out of an touchy situation - photo LH
After a second in Punta Ala, Italy and a third in Castellon, Spain the Mean Machine Mutua Madrilena crew, skippered by boat owner Peter De Ridder finally scaled the top step of the podium, winning the prestigious Breitling Trophy as the top boat of the record fleet of 21 TP52’s which contested the third event of season long Breitling MedCup TP52 championship.
Racing in the Bay of Palma, out from Peurto Portals, the biggest ever TP52 fleet had eight demanding races over an intensive four days. Opening with two three race days, followed by a 35 mile coastal race traversing the bay twice, finishing with a final windward-leeward De Ridder’s Judel-Vrolijk design is now the third boat from three different designers to win overall on the Breitling MedCup TP52 championship circuit this year.
Source: www.medcup.org
Only once did Mean Machine-Mutua Madrilena finish outwith the top three to earn a comfortable 19 points margin over Steve and Fred Howe’s Warpath. The winners in Punta Ala will rue a costly retirement from Race 6 of the series which, in the no discard regatta, they must count. The win takes De Ridder’s crew – which has a backbone of Emirates Team New Zealand sailors – to the top of the Breitling MedCup TP 52 championship standings. With three regattas still to complete, Mean Machine Mutua Madrilena now lead the standings by five points from Warpath.
Changes to sails, rig set up and crew also made the decisive difference for three times America’s Cup winner Russell Coutts and the Lexus Atalanti team who showed better speed and more consistent with their 2006 launch Botin Carkeek to finish third overall, nine points behind sistership Warpath.
It is also the first time this season that a Corinthian owner-driver has won a regatta. De Ridder has surrounded himself with an array of top talent and between his Farr 40, Mumm 30 and domestic IMS racing probably spends as many days sailing as his professional team-mates, and he is an enthusiastic and high calibre driver in his own right.
“ What it really proves is that the owner driver thing is a real thing to do, because it tells you as well looking at our results that it is not only the driver who is the guy who is bringing the boat as first boat over the line. It is about the whole team. I am just one of a team of fifteen pieces of the puzzle. So if the 15 pieces of the puzzle fit together well as a team you can race as evenly as anyone.” Attests De Ridder.
mirates Team New Zealand crew go back to work preparing their America’s Cup challenge in Valencia, Mutua Madrilena will be looking to repeat their performance on the same Mallorcan waters at the fourth regatta of the season, the prestigious Copa del Rey out of Palma.
“ We start from zero at Copa del Rey,” cautions De Ridder, “ New races new regatta and we will try to sail the bets we can and we see how it goes. There is no strategy going forwards trying to protect these five points, we don’t go and try to sail against Warpath to protect these points. We just try to sail good races every time.”
“ Consistency was the key this time.” Admits Emirates Team New Zealand’s Ray Davies, winning tactician on Mean Machine Mutua Madrilena, “The difference is we knew we had potential and the boat is quick, but with tried to sail a little more conservatively and that worked out nicely for us. We had two very bad starts, but we know the Bay very well between the Wouter, the navigator, Tom Dodson and myself I think we have a very good feeling of what is happening in the Bay here, so we could sail here with quite a lot of confidence. We have sailed quite a few Copa Del Reys, and Breitling Regattas in the past.”
“ We made a couple of small changes to the boat, a little modification in the bulb, filling a little cavity that is in the bulb for trim, so a little less area. Small modifications to the rig and some work on the sails.”
The first two days of sea-breeze racing proved to be some of the most exciting racing ever in the TP52 class. For the first time Mean Machine Mutua Madrilena lead after the first day thanks to an opening salvo of 2,2,1. With the breeze picking up to a thermally turbo charged 21 knots on the second day, the skippers and crews of all calibres came ashore with smiling. The only stressed faces were those of the Warpath team.
Hitting a glancing blow to the German boat Platoon, when they were attempting a marginal manoeuvre at the top of the firs beat of Race 6, they took a 70mm chunk out of the bow of the boat, on the waterline, and had no option but to head for the slings to start a long night for the well drilled Warpath shore crew. The 22 points netted for retiring cost them their second regatta win and the series lead.
“ We still come out with a second place counting effectively a last place we have to be pretty happy. When you look at how easy it is to gain and lose points in this fleet I think this series will be tight right up until the end. I think we are seeing that the faster boats are starting to show consistency which in this bigger fleet is vital.” Concluded Warpath’s skipper Dean Barker.
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