When it rains and is cold, no one is at sea. Except them
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Let the great ocean adventure…in the Mediterranean begin. The fifth Marina Militare Nastro Rosa Il Veloce departed from Genoa: 1492 miles from Genoa to Venice, non-stop, for ten indomitable crews in doubles aboard fast Beneteau Figaro 3, boats of just over 10 meters equipped with foils.
Kicking off the Navy Pink Ribbon The Fast
“Mind you, the 1,492 miles are theoretical,” Riccardo Simoneschi, of SSI Events, the company that, together with Defense Services and the Navy, is organizing the regatta, the icing on the cake of a packed calendar that includes the Pink Ribbon Tour and the European Offshore Mixed Championships, tells us.” are actually many more than that; between tacking and strategic choices, crews will travel at least 1,700 miles. Three times as long as the second longest race in the Mediterranean, the Rolex Middle Sea Race!” .
Seen at departure
In Genoa, before the start, the ten teams that qualified for the Pink Ribbon Il Veloce after a rigorous qualifying session in the sea of Genoa (there were as many as 32 candidate teams from all over the world, including from Australia, Ireland, Poland, France, England, Germany, and Finland), greeted the public and authorities.
Spotted: Genoa Mayor Silvia Salis, YCI President Carlo Cameli and YC Sanremo President Beppe Zaoli, Beneteau Group CEO Gianguido Girotti, CEO of Difesa Servizi SpA, Luca Andreoli, and Navy General Staff Sailing Office Director Roberto Bottazzi Schenone.
The greeting of the crews took place by taking a “bow,” at the Old Port, under the Navy’s legendary Nave Scuola Palinuro (a 1934 design from the Dubigeon shipyards in Nantes, 68.9 meters by 10.1 of beam and 1008 square meters of sails), before setting sail for the departure in front of Genoa.
The heroes who defy the Mediterranean
But who are they, these twenty brave sailors who set out on this great Mediterranean adventure “out of season,” sailing non-stop while normal people are at home watching Netflix and drinking hot tea?
Seven are Italian teams, the other three are foreign. All composed of sailors of great depth: there are Gli Isolani (representing Sardinia and Sicily) Fabrizio Carboni and Davide Foti, the Aeronautica Militare team with Giancarlo Simeoli and Niccolò Bertola, the Yacht Club Italiano crew with the very strong sailor Pietro D’Alì (a Whitbread – former Volvo Ocean Race -, two America’s Cups with Luna Rossa and the Olympics, already winner of the Veloce 2022) and Andrea Cupaioli, the Navy crew with ocean navigator Andrea Pendibene and Tommaso Banfi, Gin Tonic by Francesco Farci and Pietro Mureddu, winners of the last edition of the regatta, Kairos2 by Alessandro Doria- Federico Maywald and Le cape…Toste! by experienced Adriatic sailors Silvio Sambo and Manuel Polo.
These, on the other hand, are the foreigners to watch out for: the Brits of Norbit, Cresswell – Fellows, the strong French (to date leading after the first miles) of Team FE, Lavenant-Teo, the Germans of 2HD Offshore Racing Kennis-Bottger.
The route of the Navy Pink Ribbon The Fast
Departing from Genoa, the crews of the Navy Pink Ribbon Il Veloce will circumnavigate the Boot (“We have two motorhomes equipped as an itinerant shore team in case some crews need pit-stops due to technical problems,” Simoneschi explains) passing through some obligatory “gates. “ the first one is in front of Livorno, the second is between Corsica and Elba Island, then between Giglio and Montecristo, between Ventotene and Ischia and so on, until the last one, the twelfth, in front of Brindisi (in the Adriatic, sailing will be more “free” and therefore full of twists and turns, all the way to Venice) skimming some of the most beautiful places in Italy.
Because this is also, one of the purposes of the regatta: to enhance our territory.“Sailing has great potential to attract nautical-sport tourism,” Simoneschi never tires of repeating.
Record and 50,000 euro jackpot!
The record to beat? 8 days, 8 hours, 27 minutes and 23 seconds. It is the one that endures from the first edition, that of 2021, recorded by Team Belgium-Red Dolphins Volvo (Sophie Faguet and Jonas Gerckens).
The incentive for the crews? A rich prize pool of 50,000 euros that will be divided among all participants: the first place winner gets an impressive 20,000 euros, the second 10,000, the third 5,000 until the 10th who “consoles” himself with 1,000 euros.
There is also the “Maritime Republics Trophy” award that will be given to the team that has recorded the best positions passing the four gates of Venice, Amalfi, Pisa and Genoa.
Eugene Ruocco
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