Svea leads J Class after two close opening races in Palma

Swedish flagged Svea won both of today’s two windward leeward races at The Superyacht Cup Palma Richard Mille but they were made to work very hard by a new Rainbow team it was easy to forget was competing at their first ever J Class regatta.

In the beautiful Bay of Palma, with sea breeze conditions of 9-13kts and fierce sunshine, it was actually the newcomers on Rainbow which led Race 1 all the way to the leeward mark rounding where Svea rounded fast and smooth and so were able to get left better. The team which has dominated J Class racing in recent years hooked into the geographical gain feature to only just lead at the second top turn. By the finish, Svea’s lead had grown only a little, but they took first blood.

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The second race saw Svea start off their allocated starboard end of the line and after a long upwind drag race to the left they were able to hold Rainbow and this time lead round the first windward mark, going on to win by 1 min 33s - very similar to their winning delta in the first contest.

Svea’s tactician Tony Rey could not hide his enthusiasm as he stepped ashore at Palma’s Club de Mar, “It is just dynamite sailing, really, really special to sail these boats like this. It is fantastic racing. We had a great battle with Rainbow. And tomorrow we expect a bit more wind. It was a pretty lively couple of races.”

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Joy for Svea, not much in it…..

Rey expanded, “You look at the scoreline and the supposition is that Svea must have dominated both races and yes, the scoreline is a joy to see for us on Svea, but we were behind at the first top mark of the first race. We passed them and then we extended a little bit. But really there was not much in it. It is a very geographic racecourse. On the second race it was very even on the start line, they were on the better side of the racecourse. We had a couple of heart stopping moments; a 15 degree shift we were not expecting and a change of pressure and so on. The typical game in Palma is you must decide if you are chasing wind pressure or chasing shift. But very often when you get to that top left it is a race to the top left and in the second race it did not disappoint and we made sure we were getting to that top left every chance we had, we even coughed up some gains we had to get there.

“There is not much between the two boats at all. Our trimmers are doing a great job, and we are trying to stay dedicated to what we think are the targets and not respond to them.”

Rainbow, with new owner Peter Harrison steering and Ed Baird calling tactics, made the best start to Race 1 and for many minutes the two Js were locked in side by side in a fascinating head-to-head speed test, requiring maximum focus from both crews.

As they approached the top mark Svea were very, very close to getting the overlap which would have given the Swedish boat the advantage at the first buoy, but Rainbow held firm and rounded Mark 1 with a tiny lead. It was only at the leeward gate that Svea got through.

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Rainbow’s tactician Baird recalled, “We did not have as smooth a rounding as we needed to. We came around with good speed and a good position. But we did not have our best tack of the day. But we had such great racing today in a nice breeze.”

After their first day of J Class racing together Baird was very upbeat, “It is just incredible to race these boats, and we are so fortunate to have the opportunity. When you get to sail these J boats around a racecourse it is always an amazing day. We had two very close races with Svea, and they got the better of us, but they knew we were there. We are learning a lot about our boat. I was happy to see we were so close, for sure.”  

Friday will see two more windward-leeward races - from 1pm local time - before the Regatta concludes with a coastal race on Saturday.

Race 1

1 Svea corrected time 59m 54s
2 Rainbow 1h 01m 12s +1m 29s 

Race 2

1 Svea corrected time 1h 10m 26
2 Rainbow 1h 11m 43s +1m 33s