- Magic Carpet Cubed ghosts towards the Genoa finish line
Harnessing the navigational genius of Dutchman Marcel van Triest, Magic Carpet Cubed pipped ARCA SGR to the post.
This was set up 50 miles from the finish when she took a major hit, changing sides of the course to the east, but this enabled her to reach into the finish in better pressure as ARCA SGR attempted to run toward the line.
Thus Owen-Jones’ “cruising boat” beat her grand prix racer rival by 26 minutes, and substantially more under IRC corrected time, albeit taking 34 hours 7 minutes to complete the course, compared to 26 hours 24 minutes on the longer 240 mile route last year.
48 minutes after ARCA SGR, Tango was third home, followed by Bullitt and Spirit of Malouen.
The fifth event of seven in the International Maxi Association’s 2021-22 Mediterranean Maxi Offshore Challenge, this year’s Rolex Giraglia returned to its traditional Saint-Tropez-Giraglia-Genoa course.
Once again the overall IRC maxi prize favoured the 60 footers.
Itacentodue was 13th boat to finish into her homeport, crossing the line at 05:41:24 on Friday, winning the maxi class and coming second in the entire IRC fleet behind Giovanni di Vincenzo’s Ker 46 Lisa R.
Second maxi overall under IRC (and sixth overall) was Benoît de Froidmont’s Wally 60 Wallyño, which finished at 07:01:47 on Friday.
Canting keel yachts aren’t supposed to like light conditions, so it came as some surprise that the third maxi under IRC was Guido Paolo Gamucci’s canting keel Mylius 60 Cippa Lippa X.
Bringing up the rear in the maxi class was the 109ft Herreshoff-designed gaff schooner. While not best suited to this year’s light wind race, the crew of the 109ft long Mariette of 1915 very much enjoyed it.
As Vendée Globe skipper Miranda Merron reported from on board: “The advantage of no wind for much of the day was the wildlife fest – whales, dolphins, turtles, sunfish, mahi-mahi, tuna, bonito . . .”