Italy’s Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli beat Britain’s Athena Pathway to win the inaugural Puig Women’s America’s Cup after an impressive demonstration of cool, calm, and collected match-racing of the highest order.
From the very outset, it was Giulia Conti, skipper of Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli and starboard helm, who eked out crucial metres off the line, to tack at the left boundary to gain the early control.
From there she and her Italian crew – co-helm Margherita Porro, with trimmers Maria Giubilei and Giulia Fava – kept calm despite intense pressure from the British to never relinquish the lead over the next six legs.
Athena Pathway – led by Olympic sailor Hannah Mills, alongside Tash Bryant, and trimmers Saskia Clark and Hannah Diamond – were always a threat as they refused to give up and kept the deltas super tight all the way around the course.
At times they closed up, but there were simply no passing lanes for Athena Pathway and no possibilities to capitalise on any leverage.
A slick gybe at the port layline brought Luna Rossa across the line to secure an eight-second victory and a place in the history books as the first ever winners of the Puig Women’s America’s Cup.
Cue wild scenes of celebration onboard the Italian AC40 and also back ashore as the Italian team celebrated ecstatically the fact that they had added the Puig Women’s America’s Cup to the UniCredit Youth America’s Cup won earlier by the Luna Rossa youth team.
Understandably disappointed, but still smiling, Hannah Mills – Skipper of Athena Pathway – came ashore and said:
“It’s just tough. We couldn’t quite get back at the Italians. They did a really great job of defending and it really came down to the wire on that last run, but we couldn’t quite get past them.”
(Magnus Wheatley / America’s Cup)
