Racing under the colours of the host Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron, Emirates Team New Zealand won the Louis Vuitton Trophy Auckland regatta Sunday.

The Kiwi boat extended on every leg of the deciding five-mile race off Auckland’s East Coast Bays against the Mascalzone Latino Audi team representing Club Nautico di Roma, which is the Challenger of Record for the 34th America’s Cup.
Emirates won the first race yesterday, and with their second victory today they went 2-0 in the Finals, which race officials shortened to a best-of-three contest due to light and uncertain winds.
Right after the finish, the normally controlled and contained Emirates skipper Dean Barker had a broad smile on his face as he soaked his veteran team with champagne from a jeroboam of Moët et Chandon, not even sparing an event photographer who had climbed aboard for the occasion.
On their way to the finals, Emirates survived by one second a heart-stopping last-minute penalty turn in their match against Azzurra, the other Italian team. Today they left no doubts with a composed and clinical performance that only saw them threatened once.
Ashore after racing it was a flashback to the glory days of the America’s Cups of 2000 and 2003, as crowds thronged the quayside in the Viaduct Basin and spectators crowded every vantage point on the moored boats and surrounding balconies. Horns, sirens, cheers and applause greeted the Mascalzone Latino Audi boat as it docked at Market Square, its crew brandishing a giant banner that read “Thank you New Zealand.”
The Emirates boat arrived to more applause, flying a gigantic New Zealand blue ensign plus smaller national flags of all the competing countries. Before presenting the Louis Vuitton Trophy, Yves Carcelle, chairman and CEO of Louis Vuitton, congratulated Dean Barker, his team, and all the competing teams on the quality of their racing. “Now I hope the Cup will revive.
In the meantime, we have seen in the last few days an amazing sport competition. The fact that the boats are equalized means that it was all up to the teams and one more time, Team New Zealand has proved its domination.”
After the strong south-westerly winds that have characterized much of the regatta and forced the postponement of some races, there was a two-hour wait for wind today as the spectator fleet built in size.
Racing started at noon at the mouth of the Rangitoto Channel in a warm and shifty 10 to 12-knot westerly breeze. Barker wanted the right side of the course before the start.
Gavin Brady, the Kiwi skipper of ML Audi, wanted the left, and the pre-start was uneventful as they split away, even before they crossed the line. Brady’s tactician Morgan Larson said later that they realized in the last minutes before the gun that the right was favored but they had no option but to follow their game plan. The left finally paid off in the closing stages of the first leg, pulling the visitors back into the game.
As they closed, Emirates chose to tack short of the port tack ML Audi, only to be carried out beyond the starboard tack layline by the aggressive Italians. Brady had his opportunity to level the score and the boats were bow to stern as Emirates led around the weather mark. The Kiwi spinnaker blossomed instantaneously in a slick set the Italians couldn’t match. Just as swiftly, Emirates gybed over into the favoring left shift, catching the Italians flat-footed. Within seconds the home team enjoyed a four-boat length lead, one they never relinquished.
The finish margin was 53 seconds. “On the first beat, it didn’t look as though the right was going to come in early enough for us and it was amazing how the pressure came in and we had enough to be strong,” Barker said. “The guys did an amazing job. The first downwind was the key moment for us . . . to get the early gybe away and make a little gain there.”
Noting that his team had lost two races in the two weeks, Barker added: “It’s always satisfying when you feel that you’re sailing your best on the last day, and today we were sailing really well.”
Morgan Larson acknowledged the flawless performance of the New Zealand team. “We got a little bit of a miscommunication in the back of the boat at the weather mark and I’ll hold my hand up for that one,” he said. “If we’d gybed with them, we’d have been right on their tail.”
The overall results are:
1. Emirates Team New Zealand, New Zealand
2. Mascalzone Latino Audi, Italy
3. Azzurra, Italy
4. Artemis, Sweden
5. All4One, Germany/France
6. TEAMORIGIN, Great Britain
7. ALEPH Sailing Team, France
8. Synergy Russian Sailing Team, Russia

Η ομάδα Modus Vivendi-3Άλφα νικήτρια του March Match Race 2010. Εντυπωσιακές μονομαχίες εξελίχθηκαν σήμερα την δεύτερη και τελευταία ημέρα του March Match Race 2010 που πραγματοποιήθηκε έξω από το Μικρολίμανο με σκάφη Platu25 και την συνεργασία του ΠΟΙΑΘ.

Ο ανοιξιάτικος καιρός με τον άνεμο σε χαμηλές εντάσεις και νοτιοδυτική διεύθυνση ήταν σύμμαχος για την ολοκλήρωση του αγώνα. Τα 2 τελευταία flights του Round Robin ολοκληρώθηκαν το πρωί αναδεικνύοντας τις 4 πρώτες ομάδες που θα αγωνίζονταν στα Semi finals και στην συνέχεια στον μικρό και μεγάλο τελικό.
Η ομάδα Ωκύαλος με κυβερνήτη τον Θοδωρή Τσουλφά και πλήρωμα τους Δάφνη Κωστοπούλου, Λάμπρο Τσολάκη και Αλέξη Τσολάκη αν και έφτασε στον τελικό αήττητη, δεν κατάφερε να διατηρήσει τον τίτλο της, καθώς μονομαχώντας με την ομάδα Modus Vivendi-3Άλφα με κυβερνήτη τον Παναγιώτη Μάντη και πλήρωμα τους Παύλο Καγιαλή, Κώστα Καραγεωργίου και Αντρέα Παλερά, έχασε με 3-0 κατακτώντας τελικά την δεύτερη θέση, και δίνοντας τον τίτλο του νικητή στην ομάδα Modus Vivendi-3Άλφα.
Στον μικρό τελικό η ομάδα Αταλάντη με κυβερνήτη τον Στρατή Ανδρεάδη και πλήρωμα τους Στέλιο Σωτηρίου, Θοδωρή Πολυχρονίδη και Αναστάσιο Μηλιώνη αγωνίστηκε με την ομάδα Ursa Minor με κυβερνήτη τον Αντρέα Καραλή και πλήρωμα τους Αντρέα Θεοδωρίδη, Αλίνα Στρατηγίου και Αλέξανδρο Μοχαντάμ και κέρδισε με 2-0 την τρίτη θέση.
Αθλητές, Κριτές και Διοργανωτές αποχώρησαν ικανοποιημένοι και ανανέωσαν το ραντεβού τους για το Μ&Ν Match Race στις 7-9 Μάιου.
Φωτογραφίες και αποτελέσματα στο www.platu25.gr
photos credits Νίκος Αλευρομύτης

Τα κατάφεραν!!! Μπράβο στον Franck Cammas και το εννεαμελές πλήρωμα του.
Το Jules Verne Trophy πλέον ανήκει σε αυτούς τους δέκα άνδρες που έκανα το γύρο του κόσμου σε 48 μέρες 7 ώρες 44 λεπτά και 52 δευτερόλεπτα.
Μέση ταχύτητα 18.76 κόμβοι! (τα λόγια είναι περιττά...)
Το Groupama 3 πέρασε τη γραμμή τερματισμού στο Ushant το Σάββατο 20 Μαρτίου στις 21: 40΄45" UTC, 2 μέρες 8 ώρες και 35 λεπτά γρηγορότερα από το προηγούμενο ρεκόρ που είχε από το 2005 ο Bruno Peyron με το Orange 2.
To video του τερματισμού

Groupama 3 arrival in Brest Harbor 2010/03/21 - © Arnaud Pilpré / Studio Zedda

The acceleration is good for this final sprint thanks to a NW'ly wind of around twenty knots and the finish off the Créac'h lighthouse is scheduled during the course of tonight.

However Groupama 3 won't enter the harbour of Brest until after sunrise, at around 0830 hours UTC after a little more than 48 days at sea!
"We may have a little too much sail aloft at the moment with the solent jib and mainsail, but we can't afford to hang about. There's a ridge of high pressure coming up behind us and we mustn't get caught up in the calm conditions... We don't yet know what time we're going to cross the finish line and that's not that important, though it's always good to be as far ahead of the previous reference time as possible. We're being a bit shaken about! Our main focus is to arrive in one piece... We're sticking to the same habits though and we're maintaining our normal watch rhythm" indicated Franck Cammas during the 1130 UTC radio session with Groupama's Race HQ in Brest.
Groupama 3's log (departure on 31st January at 13h 55' 53'' UTC)
...
Day 45 (17th March 1400 UTC): 441 miles (lead = 412 miles)
Day 46 (18th March 1400 UTC): 579 miles (lead = 828 miles)
Day 47 (19th March 1400 UTC): 588 miles (lead = 1.165 miles)
Day 48 (20th March 1400 UTC): 600 miles (lead = 1.412 miles)

Emirates Team New Zealand pulled off two key victories today, first winning match point in a Semi-Final race and then prevailing in the first Finals race of the Louis Vuitton Trophy Auckland regatta.

The host team will continue its best-of-five match in the Finals tomorrow, racing against the Mascalzone Latino Audi team representing Club Nautico di Roma, which is the Challenger of Record for the America’s Cup. Racing started in the approaches to the Rangitoto Channel off Auckland’s East Coast beaches in the early afternoon, after a long wait for an uncertain sou-west breeze to fill-in and settle.
The shifty breeze was moderate all day, ranging between 10 and 14 knots.Emirates and Azzurra were 1-1, after the Kiwi’s nail-biter one second win on Friday. There was plenty at stake. The Italian team won the Louis Vuitton Trophy Nice last November, beating Emirates. The host Kiwi team had won the Louis Vuitton Pacific Series event in Auckland last year and they were aiming for a repeat victory.
Emirate’s skipper Dean Barker wanted the right side of the course and, with the starboard entry, he wielded the advantage with clinical detachment.“It wasn’t easy that’s for sure,” Barker said. “Conditions aren’t exactly even or stable, it keeps you on the edge of your toes all the time. But it felt very controlled from our guys. The nice thing is the composure of our guys, which we’ve really been working hard on. Even though things got tight at times, the guys kept doing their job well.
”With their Finals berth safe, the Emirates team enjoyed a break until they returned to race Mascalzone Latino Audi. It proved to be a nail-biter for their Kiwi fans.Barker pulled off a come-from-behind victory after conceding the lead at the second mark. In the pre-start, the New Zealanders came within centimetres of a penalty as they tacked away from ML Audi’s Gavin Brady but the incident was green-flagged by the umpires. Brady took the lead at the second leeward mark only to concede it when Barker split away on the windward leg and got back ahead.
Emirates Team New Zealand Managing Director Grant Dalton, who also sails on the boat, summed up the day. “I think the bottom line is that we can still sail a lot better. We have to just keep working at it. It tends to click eventually,” Dalton said. “Brady is a bit more aggressive, he came close to copping a couple of penalties today on the start, one I thought was pretty close on the edge. But that’s up to Dean, he deals with it all the time.
The whole thing is a bit disjointed because you’re not flowing, week on week on week. So you can’t expect to be going at the normal rate of incremental improvement every day. But we’ve got to be reasonably happy at the moment, going one-up in the final."
Race One – Semi-Final: Emirates Team New Zealand def. Azzurra, 00:26
Emirates had the starboard end advantage and used it throughout the prestart to hold Azzurra’s Francesco Bruni out from the right side of the course. They came to the line at speed on starboard, in a shifty 10-knot breeze, well separated and with the Italians just bow out. Emirates held for a few seconds and then tacked away into a right shift. When they closed for the first cross 30 seconds later the Kiwis on starboard had a lead of nearly two boat lengths.
Approaching the top mark and above the port lay line, Italy pulled back into close contact on a big left shift, but NZ’s Dean Barker luffed them momentarily before the mark before bearing away and opening a lead of several boat lengths that he never relinquished.
Tommaso Chieffi, Azzurra tactician, said “we entered on port so it was already a difficult situation. On the second beat, we had the jib halyard come undone. We had to ease the jib out, and that lost us about 20 seconds. God knows, if it was closer in the last part of the race, it may have been a different story but it wasn’t our day.”
Race Two - 1st Final: Team New Zealand def. Mascalzone Latino Audi, 00:12
After his close miss, Barker coolly controlled the prestart, pushing Brady above the committee boat before returning and speeding off on starboard with the Italians trailing on his hip. Emirates first mark lead was 14 seconds but the Italians got on their wind on the run to round ahead at the leeward mark.
Barker said, “you’re happy sometimes to give up some distance if it means that you put yourself in a stronger position. And we did a nice job of that on the second beat – in the end we were able to extend quite a bit.”
Brady got out to the right but it didn’t pay. He let the boats get widely separated on a long port tack and the lead changed again as Barker found more favorable breeze on the left. Barker led by 12 seconds at the third mark and also at the finish. Brady’s tactician Morgan Larson took the long view. “We’re really happy, the guys are sailing the boat better than we have all week,” he said. “We’ve just got to get a little tighter in the afterguard and keep our communication good and look at it more like a match race.”
Race Three – Petit Final: Azzurra def Artemis
Italy’s Azzurra won their Petit Final match against Artemis as the Swedish boat copped two penalties in an early evening race. In the pre-start dial-up Terry Hutchinson in the port entry boat was late completing his initial tack and the blue penalty flag went up.
Francesco Bruni took Azzurra over the start line just to weather of Artemis and bow out. It was a one tack leg as the boats straight-lined at equal speeds all the way out to the port tack lay-line where Artemis was forced to follow their opponent into the mark.
The Italians dominated the next two legs until Artemis pulled level on the last run, only to be penalized again for failing to respond to a luff.
Azzurra pulled away to win as the Swedish boat began its penalty turn.

TEAMORIGIN’s new TP52 hit the water for the first time today and the team’s shore crew, sailors and designers were there in force to enjoy this exciting moment for the team.

Despite losing a key race yesterday in the Louis Vuitton Trophy Auckland regatta, the TEAMORIGIN sailors were back in the gym and out for a fitness run first thing this morning and then headed out on the water with a new and exciting project on their hands.
The team sailed the impressive new boat close to the semi-final action of the regatta and turned a few heads David Duff, Shore Operations Manager for TEAMORIGIN, commented on the first day’s testing, “It went really well today, we’ve had a very tight schedule and have managed hit all the deadlines spot on so it was very pleasing to see the boat on the water today. It’s pretty impressive to take her out of the shed only two days ago and be sailing in 20 knots today. I’d like to thank everyone who has played a key part in this challenging project.
Juan Kouyoumdjian and his team at Juan Yacht Design, Greg Salthouse and the boat build team at Salthouse boatbuilders, North Sails, Southern Spars and our own TEAMORIGIN build and shore team of Nick Bice, Sam Bourne, Dylan Fletcher and Marty Oliver.”
The team will carry out another few days of testing and the boat then gets loaded onto a ship and heads to Europe for its racing season. TEAMORIGIN will compete in the YP52 Audi Med Cup series which consists of 5 regattas around the Mediterranean, with the first event taking place in Cascais starting on 10th May 2010.
Juan Kouyoumdjian (Juan K), Principal Designer of the boat, witnessed the maiden sail today and gave his views “I was really happy to see the boat on the water today, it went extremely well and we passed the structural test phase very quickly and were able to move on to pushing the boat. It performed exactly like we expected it to perform on the first day.”
Ben Ainslie, Skipper and Helmsman of TEAMORIGIN, ommented on the forthcoming TP racing, “We are looking forward to our first crack at the TP52 Audi Med Cup Series, it’s been a really useful project so far from both a design and sailing team perspective and will great to race against some top teams this coming season.”

Στην τελική ευθεία μπήκε η προσπάθεια του Cammas και του πληρώματος του για την επιτυχία της προσπάθειάς τους για το ρεκόρ στο γύρο του κόσμου με πολύγαστρο σκάφος.

Πριν μερικές μέρες η επιτυχία της προσπάθειας φαινόταν δύσκολη ως και αδύνατη, ειδικά όταν το Groupama 3 πριν μερικές μέρες είχε μείνει σχεδόν 500νμ πίσω από το χρόνο του Orange 2.
Τις τελευταίες όμως ημέρες τα πράγματα έχουν αλλάξει άρδην και με τη βοήθεια του καιρού το Groupama 3 κερδίζει συνεχώς μίλια έναντι του στόχου του. Μάλιστα έχει καταφέρει μέσα σε 7 μέρες να καλύψει σχεδόν 3.500νμ!
© Guilain GRENIER / Sea & Co
Οπότε αν όλα πάνε σύμφωνα με το σχέδιο το ρεκόρ είναι σχεδόν σίγουρο. Το μόνο που έχει να κάνει το εννεαμελές πλήρωμα του Cammas είναι να προσαρμόζεται στις συνεχείς αλλαγές του ανέμου που η πρόβλεψη δίνει και να εύχονται να μην σπάσει τίποτα πάνω στο σκάφος.
Groupama 3's log (departure on 31st January at 13h 55' 53'' UTC)
...
Day 44 (16th March 1400 UTC): 401 miles (lead = 72 miles)
Day 45 (17th March 1400 UTC): 441 miles (lead = 412 miles)
Day 46 (18th March 1400 UTC): 579 miles (lead = 828 miles)
Day 47 (19th March 1400 UTC): 552 miles (lead = 1.167 miles)