Claudia Rossi Crowned J/70 European Champion!
Kiel, July 4th- The second J/70 European Championship saw ninety-six boats from fifteen nations sail eleven races over the four day series in everything from stormy weather with epic planing conditions to sunny days with benign, shifty breezes. Kiel YC hosted the regatta with racing taking place in the choppy waters of the southern Baltic Sea called the Schilksee. The surprise winner of the event was top Italian woman skipper Claudia Rossi and her Petite Terrible crew of Matteo Mason, Simone Spangaro and Michele Paoletti. Claudia sailed an amazing series, she scored all top five finishes and, in fact, tossed a 5th place to score just 29 pts net in ten races- a remarkable 2.9 average! Claudia Rossi was hoping to follow the same successful path in Kiel that her father did two years earlier. In 2014, her father, Alberto, won the ORC Worlds in the outer fjord with his boat ENFANT TERRIBLE. Evidently, Claudia has the same competitive fire in her blood as her Dad! In fact, Alberto himself flew to Kiel on Thursday to cheer on his daughter.
Day 1 Report
Because of the size of the fleet, the 96 teams were split into four flights that would rotate after each race in order to race each other with 48 teams on the starting line. After the first race day of racing, several southern European teams were dominating the standings. Stefano Roberti’s Piccinina from the YC Monaco J/70 fleet was at the top of the leaderboard after posting a smoking-hot 2-1-1 scoreline. They were followed by two Italian crews- Carlo Alberini’s Calvi Network (1-2-2) and Claudia Rossi’s Petite Terrible (1-4-2).
Day 2 Report
For the J/70 sailors, it was a late one on the race area on their second day. In the light and shifty breezes, the race committee managed to start two races, before the wind finally disappeared when they were trying to start the third race. So PRO Thorsten Paech decided to send the crews back to the dock.The leaders of the fleet changed, with Rossi’s Petite Terrible taking the lead with a 1-5 compared to Roberti’s PICCININA with a 4-6. For many in the top ten, it was the fifth and last race of the day that saw some dramatically bad races posted on the scoreboard.
Day 3 Report
The third day appeared to have an enormous effect on the points table. In the first race for the Blue fleet over 30 boats were disqualified due to an early start. And several crews were subsequently judged OCS in other races. But, staying clear of trouble was Ms Rossi’s crew on PetiteTerrible, as she continued her winning ways with scores of 1-4-4 to become the unchallenged leader of the fleet.No fewer than 38 disqualifications from OCS’s were reported in the list of the 94 teams. The biggest leaderboard climber on the day was Eduardo Lupi’s Torpyone from Italy (3-5-2).
Day 4 Finale
The regatta finished with a packed program of three races. And the weather on the race course made it a perfect day, after difficult wind conditions and a huge number of disqualifications had caused lots of turbulence in the highly competitive class. By sailing a perfect series of races on the final day, Roberti’s Piccinina counted three victories to end up taking the silver while Gonzalo Araujo from Spain posted a 2-1-5 to vault into the bronze medal to finish off the podium. Rounding out the top five were Lupi’s Torpyone in fourth, suffering from having to throw out a Black Flag in the last race, and in fifth was Santa Cruz’s.
Rossi’s Petite Terrible performance was a surprise for the top J/70 sailors and, also, for herself: “I had not expected to win when I came here. We only had the boat since February. But, the crew had an ambitious objective and made us fast!” The young sailor from Italy has been racing for years at an Olympic level in Italy. Sailing seems to come naturally for her and her family. She remarked that, “Kiel is a very lucky sailing territory for our family! Now, I am looking forward to going home, where my boyfriend is waiting, and we will have a huge party!”