Dubai: The Dubai International Marine Club (DIMC)-organised eighth and final event of the RC 44 Championship Tour 2007 got off to a flying start on Thursday.
The Dubai Gold Cup is also the first overseas regatta event for the RC 44 fleet. All RC 44s have been transported together, on their custom-made containers.
The regatta will reassemble eight teams, representing the eight nations. Both fleet and match races are scheduled. The winners will be the team with the least points in the combined fleet and match races.
The three leaders of the RC 44 Championship Tour 2007 - Chris Bake's Team Aqua, with pro sailor Cameron Appleton; Russell Coutts' Team Omega and Miroslav Reljanovic's Cro-A-Sail - are comfortably established at the top of the RC 44 Championship Tour.
However, the regatta promises to be intense with newcomers ES Bankers Dubai (Patrick De Barros/Dean Barker), Team Ceeref (Igor Lah/ James Spithill) and Team Hiroshi-Citta di Milano (Armando Giulietti/Sebastien Col).
The Dubai Gold Cup runs till today with fleet races. A match-racing round-robin was held on Friday and yesterday. The teams will complete the fleet races today.
A short coastal race has been incorporated in the fleet-race ranking. With such an exceptional group of some of the best sailors in the world, the event promises to be quite exciting.
As Julien Di Biase, the RC 44 Class manager, explains: "The goal of the class is to get the owners and RC 44 sailors to race in good sailing conditions, but also to find venues where people can have fun once the boats are moored."
Speaking at a press conference held earlier in the week, the DIMC managing director, Saeed Hareb, welcomed the teams and extended his wishes to the participants.
The first RC 44 Champion will be crowned today. The Class Association is looking forward to concluding a very successful debut season and is proud to announce that the 2008 programme is already finalised.
The conditions were quite difficult during Wednesday's practice race, with a fairly big left-over seaway due to the strong shamaal the previous days.
However, the conditions did not stop the favourite teams from dominating the training session.
