Practice races are supposed to mean nothing. Sailors tend to sandbag them, saving their best work for when it counts. Nobody told Luna Rossa.
The Bay of Naples put on a show for the first day of Practice Racing, and it was Luna Rossa's Principal team who made the biggest statement of all. Led by Peter Burling in the starboard pod alongside co-helm Marco Gradoni and trimmers Maria Giubilei and Gigi Ugolini, the team won all three races going away, at times by margins of up to 500 metres.
It was no fluke. Luna Rossa read the right-hand side of the course to perfection each time, bouncing off the starboard boundary and picking the wind bends as the breeze swung from southerly to south-westerly through the afternoon.
Starts were conservative by the team's own standards, but it hardly mattered. They found gaps, took the lead, and simply sailed away from the fleet.
Team coach Simone Salva was happy with both Luna Rossa crews. "For sure, both teams managed the day very well," he said. "I think it was amazing to see the second race with a one and two, and amazing how Margherita and Max pulled out from a couple of tough situations, both in the start and also around the course."
The surprise packet of the day was ARC Team USA. Harry Melges IV and Lucas Calabrese, sailing together after training out of Pensacola, Florida and more recently in Naples, looked smooth through the manoeuvres, even nailing a tricky double gybe at the leeward gate in race two. They finished second overall for the day, though it does not count towards the regatta.
Calabrese, co-helm alongside Melges, was pleased but wary of getting carried away. "We're all pretty happy with how the day went. Obviously, we'd be kidding ourselves if we think this is it, right? The regatta hasn't been started yet, and it's a long way to the Cup next year," he said. "We're really just focusing on being the best we can be, trying to be good teammates with each other, helping each other, learning to work together, and today showed that it's working pretty well so far. So we've just got to keep on the same track."
It was a scrappier day for Emirates Team New Zealand. Nathan Outteridge and Seb Menzies wrestled with start-line trouble that left them fighting out of the pack for much of the afternoon, though a strong showing in the second flight gave the team something to build on. They will debrief hard tonight.
Trimmer Iain Jensen, one of the most decorated sailors in the sport, summed up the challenge. "Once or twice we didn't get out of the start very well and then you are dictated to a little bit. So, you're trying to get on the lifting tack, you're trying to get to the right, but your options are very limited as well," he said. "So, it's kind of a bit like gold dust when you find a good opportunity to get back into the race and you're always sort of hunting for it."
There was a near-miss, too. Team NZ flirted with a port-tack start in race two before ducking clear at the last moment. "We were pretty close, but maybe not something you try to do on the practice day, I guess," Jensen said. "I think they probably would've still got at our diamonds, so I think the duck was the right call, but we definitely thought about it for a moment!"
The Kiwis finished third overall on the day.
Luna Rossa's second crew, the Women & Youth team skippered by Margherita Porro with Max Antoniazzi on co-helm, grew into the afternoon and were pushing the Principal team hard by race three. They looked composed and polished, a team clearly on the rise.
Porro was pleased with the trajectory despite an early setback. "It was a good day out there, especially for our senior team," she said. "But we had some problems with the boat... Our clew got stuck at the pre-start so we couldn't move it, and the mainsail basically was inverting upwind because of the cunningham, and it was hard to sail, but also dangerous for the battens to break, so we preferred to not finish it. But overall, we did some good starts and there was good communication between me and Max. Max did a very good job. It was his first day out there racing, so really nice job."
GB1, the Challenger of Record, finished level on points with Luna Rossa's Women & Youth crew, but felt they left plenty out there. A fall off the foils, apparently from a mis-communication, was the low point.
"I think we were pretty rusty today," Dylan said. "It showed that we haven't done much sailing compared to some of the others but for us, it was a fantastic opportunity to see what the racecourse was like in that direction... I need to learn how to start on port! Looking forward to the rest of the week and racing."
Emirates Team New Zealand's Women & Youth crew, led by Jake Pye, started brightly with a second in race one before slipping mid-pack as small positional errors crept in. There was real composure whenever the young Kiwi team found themselves in the leading group.
"It was a really good start to the day. Had a great first race and just leading on into the rest of the day, we had a good understanding of what was out there on the course," Pye said. "But yeah, we just found ourselves with a few hiccups and getting stuck a bit in the back... We know we've got more to offer on the table, so we're trying to dig into that for tomorrow and the weekend."
It was a tough day for Tudor Team Alinghi. Trimmer Pietro Sibello did not sugarcoat it. "For sure it was not the best day for us on the water, but it was great to have a bit of training with the full fleet today," he said. "We had some bad starts. A couple of extra penalties that we should have avoided and also it was tough at times to keep the lanes, compared to the other boats. So there is a lot, going on now, right now to get the improvements for tomorrow."
La Roche-Posay Racing Team were similarly frank. Co-helm Diego Botín pointed to a lack of recent time in the boat. "We have some good feelings in some areas and I think we feel confident that we can do good races, and at the same time we didn't sail the AC40 as much because we didn't touch the boat since the last AC regatta in Cagliari," he said. "Today was a big learning day for us and look, we don't know where we're going to finish honestly, but we are looking forward to it. We are confident we can do good races, as I said, and if we can find this consistency around the weekend, we can be fighting at the top."
Hannah Mills OBE, skipper of GB2, pointed to the unforgiving nature of the course itself. "It was a tough day in terms of the results, but in terms of what we were trying to work on with the starts, we actually had some really strong starts, it was good," she said. "Just a bit slow into certain things on the racecourse and, honestly, one tiny mistake at the top marks or wherever, and that top mark is so tight that if you get a cross wrong or tack in a bit of a bad lane, then you're just sucked to the back."
Three more races are scheduled for tomorrow from 2pm CEST, with trickier weather forecast. In the Bay of Naples, that could mean a day where nobody wins the regatta outright, but plenty could lose it.
