Barking Mad USA 2009 Farr 40 World Champion (Photo By Kurt Arrigo)
You cannot ask for much more. Tremendous racing conditions with a building Mistral and a lumpy sea, made worse by the constant attention of the spectator fleet. Porto Cervo laid it on thick and the Rolex Farr 40 Worlds 2009 delivered. None more so than the new World Champions Barking Mad (USA) and runners up, Nerone (ITA).
Nerone ITA 2nd Place Overall Farr 40 World Champions (Photo by Kurt Arrigo)
Nerone went out all guns blazing. Once again she took the left side of the course popping out from the pin; tactician Vasco Vascotto relying on his vast experience in these waters to take the initiative early, He could not have been more right. First to the windward mark, Nerone led around the track to win from Giovanni Maspero’s Joe Fly and Helmut Jahn’s Flash Gordon (USA). Barking Mad, meanwhile, had opted for the centre and according to Richardson, things did not go as well as intended.
These are the moments that championships are won and lost. Rounding the top mark mid-fleet, the American crew may have briefly wondered if this was the regatta slipping away from them.
But Richardson and crew had a game plan and were not about to give up on it just yet, as Hutchinson chips in, “without question we felt we could win going into the start of the week. But feeling it and doing it are two completely different things. When we lined up on the first day we had a mode that we have not had in a while. We had a game plan of being safe and the mantra all week on the boat was that we just want to get on base, we didn’t want to hit any home runs, just keep getting on base and advancing the runners.” To get back ‘on base’ in this race was going to take some effort.
If doubts were creeping-in none were shown. “We showed a lot of fortitude to sail back through the fleet to finish sixth which kept us one point in the lead,” said a relieved Richardson.
The minds of both crews must have been buzzing heading to the start of the final deciding race.
Again, it was all down to keeping one’s head and applying the game plan. Nerone headed left once more. Mezzaroma confirmed their strategy did not change because of their relative position to the leader, “we were one point behind and were not in a position to control them. So we had to make our own race.” On Barking Mad, the lure of the left was not so strong. This was a conservative crew after all.
According to Richardson, immediately before the start, “we just looked at each other and said this is why we’re here. We’re here for an opportunity to win the regatta on the last race. What more could you want.” Any self-doubts were kept private, though post-race Richardson confessed to some troubled thoughts, “I never doubted my team’s capability. But leading wire-to-wire puts a little bit of extra pressure on each and every race. In 1999, we led going into the last race and ended up third, so that was in the back of my mind. I felt pretty comfortable that we were going to be able to get a good start in the race and get around the course in good shape. We certainly weren’t giving up. We knew we had our hands full, but we knew we had to sail well and that is what we did.”
As the initial beat unwound, the crew of Barking Mad found themselves in second place, hot on the heels of Alessandro Barnaba’s Fiamma (ITA) and overtaking them at the offset mark with a textbook spinnaker hoist. Those watching the racing started counting back to Nerone. The left had clearly not paid. In fact, it had bitten the Italian crew hard. The miraculous recovery of the previous day that kept them in the hunt was going to have to be repeated. That was a Herculian task. Barking Mad were not sailing as though their lives depended on it, they did not need to. They just needed to keep between Nerone and the finish, as Hutchinson explained, “the team responded brilliantly. We got a great start. We got a little break from Plenty, who let us tack across them. From there it was into a good lead and extend. Fortunately Nerone was back. They gained on us on the second beat, but we were safe down at the bottom mark. At that point it was about minimising damage and sailing a good clean race through to the finish.”
Joe Fly (ITA) Leads The Fleet Downwind (Photo by Kurt Arrigo)
With Barking Mad home and dry in second, the finish of Nerone was immaterial, although eighth was good enough to hold onto the runner’s-up position overall.
A feature of the Farr 40 fleet is the friendly rivalry between crews on and off the water. Vascotto and Hutchinson have been adversaries for many years, but they found time to speak this morning before heading onto the course, as Hutchinson remarks, And, it is evident that the competitors hold each other in a regard rarely seen in other sports. “Sailing against somebody like Vasco makes you a better sailor and we hold the highest respect for that team,” he adds.
Both Hutchinson and Richardson knew they had been engaged in a battle royal. When they last won in San Francisco it was by 40-points. Mezzaroma echoed the quality of the contest, “it was a great competition sailing against all these good crews, these good boats. It is the key of the Farr 40. The level is always so high, it becomes higher and higher every year.” Vascotto, too, was gracious in defeat, “I think we did a fantastic championship: three firsts, two seconds, two eighths – usually you win with these kind of results! This time we found in front of us Barking Mad, sailed in a perfect way. We tried our best, but this is sport.”
For Richardson, it is a dream come true, “We’re very, very happy. Coming to Italy and winning this World Championship in Porto Cervo is an amazing feeling for us. There are so many good teams out there, particularly the Italians and to be able to win in their home waters is a great thrill for us.
We tried to stay calm all week. It’s easy to get too wound up and too hyped up. Our basic philosophy throughout the regatta was not to take chances, or take risks. If necessary we ducked boats rather than try to force an issue. Our point-score is a tribute to how well we sailed the boat, without taking any risks. Our worst race was a sixth and that is pretty good.” He is not kidding, no previous winner of the Rolex Farr 40 Worlds has averaged less than four points for the Championship. As Vascotto pointed out, even Nerone’s score would have won in all previous years.
For Vincenzo Onorato, the outgoing, three-time (in a row) World Champion, who laughingly remarked that his last race this year was the first race of his 2010 Rolex Farr 40 Worlds campaign, this was “a wonderful story for the Class.”
After four days of competition, played out in an exceptional venue, we’ll allow the winners to sum it up: “there’s nothing better than this, that’s for sure!”
PROVISIONAL STANDINGS AFTER 10 RACES
Place, Boat Name, Owner, Nation, R1-R2-R3-R4-R5-R6-R7-R8-R9-R10-Points
1. BARKING MAD Jim Richardson USA, 1-6-4-1-6-6-3-3-6-2-38.00
2. NERONE Massimo Mezzaroma ITA, 5-1-13-2-4-2-1-8-1-8-45.00
3. JOE FLY Giovanni Maspero ITA, 4-5-5-4-1-19-2-6-2-5-53.00
4. MASCALZONE LATINO Vincenzo Onorato ITA, 2-10-2-9-8-1-13-13-7-1-66.00
5. FLASH GORDON Helmut Jahn USA, 20-4-3-11-11-20-4-2-3-3-81.00
6. PLENTY Alex Roepers USA, 12,13,19,13,10,4,15-5-4-7-102.00
7. TWINS Erik Maris FRA, 14-8-15-14-5-5-6-18-8-9-102.00
8. TRANSFUSION Guido Belgiorno-Nettis AUS, 9-7-1-3-20-25-5-4-17-13-104.00
9. ESTATE MASTER Lisa & Martin Hill AUS, 8-18-10-7-15-21-9-10-5-10-113.00
10. TWT Marco Rodolfi ITA, 6-9-14-19-13-13-7-1-20-15-117.00
Joe Fly Chasing Barking Mad (Photo by Kurt Arrigo / Rolex)
Barking Mad (USA) heads the table after another day of conservatism, whilst Nerone (ITA) stands six-points behind in second, after a performance of truly mercurial liberalism. Two opposing race strategies seemingly on a collision course.
With two races left, Joe Fly (ITA) in third is by no means out of it, but bridging a sixteen-point gap will require a god of Jupiter’s standing to step in. Current World Champions, Mascalzone Latino (ITA), will go down fighting to the last, but a twenty-eight-point gap to the lead looks insurmountable even for the miracle workers on board.
Three races today in a building westerly, with an underlying sea swell running, made for excellent racing conditions. Again, we had three different winners. Vincenzo Onorato looked to have put yesterday behind him, carving out a fine victory on Mascalzone Latino. The next two races though were killers for his Championship aspirations, as Mascalzone scored 13, 13. Massimo Mezzaroma’s Nerone picked the plum in race two, following a second in race one. All this good work was almost wiped out as he started the third race too early. In that race, Marco Rodolfi and TWT (ITA) finally showed their true potential passing Helmut Jahn and Flash Gordon (USA) on the final leg to win.
2nd Place Boat Flash Gordon (Photo by Kurt Arrigo)
The first race was notable for Joe Fly being over early. Giovanni Maspero’s crew could finish no better than nineteenth, pushing them back in the standings, while Mascalzone’s first and Nerone’s second place had enabled them to close the gap to Barking Mad which finished sixth.
Come the second race, conditions had picked up further and the tension on the racecourse was becoming tangible. As the initial beat unwound at the first windward rounding, Mascalzone’s recovery looked to be short lived as she struggled round in mid-fleet. At the front, Nerone led with Barking Mad in fifth – a result that would level their scores. But the race was far from over.
Joe Fly was in second place. Maspero and tactician, Francesco Bruni, were sailing her like a blowfly, an annoying presence buzzing all around Mezzaroma and his tactician, Vasco Vascotto, engaging in every strategy possible to try to get past. Further back, the normally steadfast Barking Mad crew appeared to be pushing hard to limit the potential loss to Nerone. Sitting behind Goombay Smash and Flash Gordon at the first leeward rounding, Terry Hutchinson worked some magic to pass first Doug Douglass and then slip in front of Helmut Jahn at the second windward mark. The dogfighting was not finished by any means, but those two precious places saved meant the difference between Barking Mad leading overall at the end of the race or seeing their position eroded still further.
As it was, the third race of the day proved to be the more critical. In keeping with his character, Vascotto looked to seize the initiative early. One of a clutch of boats aiming to secure the pin end of the line, Nerone looked to have hit the line perfectly and at speed. A few seconds later, the heros to zeros were heading back to restart. One of two boats caught over early by the vigilant race officials. Quite what goes through the mind of top class tactician at this critical point in a World Championship regatta is anyone’s guess. What marks them out though as better than the rest is their response.
With the fleet heading left, Nerone went right. By the first windward mark she was only up to nineteenth and it looked game-over. Barking Mad rounded in third, a position she never gave up. By the finish, though, Nerone had played the poker hand of poker hands and crossed the line in eighth. Some recovery. In the circumstances, bleeding only five-points to the Americans must have felt like the aftermath successful heart-surgery. Bruised but certainly not dead and buried.
Vascotto was his usual chirpy-self once back ashore and the great escapologist is certainly no apologist, “it was a really good day after two races and I think we sail the best race in the last one when we started over the line and we had a great recovery because we finished eighth. We are inside the championship still and I think tomorrow will be a great day. It will be a lot of fun, should be a lot of wind and we’ll try to be ready for the fight.”
Even when she won the Championship in 2003, Nerone did not opt for the steady approach, starting and finishing the event with some appalling scores. Vascotto is refreshing in his processing of their performances so far, “it’s quite difficult to stay consistent, but I think that we have had a great Championship except for the third race of the first day and the third race of the last day. With a little more conservatism maybe we could be leading this championship, but we are second and still ready to fight.” Wouldn’t he be happier sailing more conservatively? “I’m not able to sail conservatively!” is the reply.
For Jim Richardson, a two-time World Champion in the Class, it could not be much better going into the last day. Averaging under four-points a race would have won all previous Rolex Farr 40 Worlds, so the Barking Mad crew is on the money at this event. Understandably, Richardson chooses his words carefully when describing their performance so far. There are still two races to go and the Championship is clearly his to lose, “I think we are sailing very well. I think we are sailing conservatively, we’re not taking chances even though sometimes we start on the wrong end of the line, away from the bias, so that we do not get congested or influenced to be over the line.”
Richardson is explaining a strategy that could not be more opposite in appearance to that displayed by Nerone, as he continues, “I’m not entirely surprised at some of the mistakes being made. People get aggressive and want to get to the start line bow out and sometimes it causes people to be over the line. We’ve taken sterns when we needed to, we’ve not pushed anything on the racecourse, we’ve figured it best to come in sixth rather than spend three hours in the protest room to maybe come in third. We’re just trying to avoid the big mistakes and hope that people around us make them.”
Farr 40 Worlds Fleet On the Downwind Leg (Photo by Kurt Arrigo)
So far Barking Mad have made no mistakes. They are the exception in this Championship. The question tomorrow is conservatism versus liberalism, which one will win through. It is a fascinating struggle that has even the normally irrepressible Geoff Stagg almost speechless, “in my opinion it’s Barking Mad’s to lose. Everyone else around them has tripped. They have been so consistent, they are starting very clean and do not appear to be rattled on the water. But it’s a World Championship. Nerone is barking at the door. Two races to go, only six-points in it. Anything can happen.” We can’t wait.
PROVISIONAL STANDINGS AFTER RACE 8
Place, Boat Name, Owner, Nation, R1-R2-R3-R4-R5-R6-R7-R8-Points
1. BARKING MAD Jim Richardson USA, 1-6-4-1-6-6-3-3-30.00
2. NERONE Massimo Mezzaroma ITA, 5-1-13-2-4-2-1-8-36.00
3. JOE FLY Giovanni Maspero ITA, 4-5-5-4-1-19-2-6-46.00
4. MASCALZONE LATINO Vincenzo Onorato ITA, 2-10-2-9-8-1-13-13-58.00
5. TRANSFUSION Guido Belgiorno-Nettis AUS, 9-7-1-3-20-25-5-4-74.00
6. FLASH GORDON Helmut Jahn USA, 20-4-3-11-11-20-4-2-75.00
7. TWT Marco Rodolfi ITA, 6-9-14-19-13-13-7-1-82.00
8. TWINS Erik Maris FRA, 14-8-15-14-5-5-6-18-85.00
9. PLENTY Alex Roepers USA, 12,13,19,13,10,4,15-5-91.00
10. FIAMMA Alessandro Barnaba ITA, 3-12-7-10-24-10-16-12-94.00
The Rolex Farr 40 World Championship 2009 is organised by the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda and the Farr 40 Class Association. Racing is being held in the waters off Porto Cervo, Sardinia and runs from Wednesday, 24 June to Saturday, 27 June.
