Day one…
The first Formula World Grand Prix event started today here in the beautiful beach of S.Torpes, in Sines. Most of the top formula sailors all came to Portugal for the event that has a prize purse of twenty thousand Euros and is being superbly organized by Overpower Clube.
We had an early skippers meeting and afterwards everyone relaxed and waited for the wind to show up. At around 2pm, we were sent to the water and everyone had their big sails rigged. We managed to complete one race in really light winds of around 7-9 knots.
At the start, some sailors got stuck and had a bad start, while others decided to tack and go towards shore. The ones that headed to shore, which included Steve Allen, Fabio Melo, Miguel Martinho and Alberto Menegatti, didn’t get the good shift. Jesper, Wojtec, Polonski, Gonzalo and myself, all went out and got stronger winds that took us to the upwind mark ahead of the others.
Rounding the first upwind was Jesper, followed by Gonzalo and Polonoski. On the downwind, Jesper jibed early and had to double jibe, leaving Gonzalo to take the lead and control the race on the second upwind and downwind to the finish, with Jesper chasing in second. On the second upwind, Steve had a huge come back, rounding the top mark in third was Polonoski, Steve, myself and Miguel Martinho all very close together. Steve overtook Polonoski and finished in third with Polonoski in fourth, myself in fifth, Miguel Martinho in sixth, Wojtek in seventh, Begalli in eight, Mathias Pinheiro in Ninth and Fernando Martinez closing the top 10.
Afterwards, the wind just failed show up and Claudio Alessandrello (race director) called it a day.
Tomorrow skippers meeting is set for 10 am and the forecast looks good.
Cheers,
Willhelm Schurmann ( BRA999)
