GER 1123 “Pow Wow” Michael Zankel, Pedro Andrade and Phil Blinn Win in CASCAIS..
It was a fantastic final day in Cascais with a 16kt Easterly Breeze that enabled 3 more races to be completed giving everyone a great weekend of sailing… World Champion Klaus Diederichs GBR 758 “Fever” set the early pace by winning race 4 (the first race of the day), but Michael Zankel managed a 3rd place in GER 1123 “Pow Wow” which kept the pressure on as he was now able to discard his 10th place from yesterday… 2nd in the first race of the day was GER 1102 “Hombre” helmed by Philipp Pechstein, who was putting together a very consistent series which would see him, Roman Koch & Bernd Hoermann finish in 4th place overall…
With both Diederichs and Zankel watching out for each other in race 5 (the second race of the day), it was in fact SWE 385 “Still Crazy” Stefan Winberg who took the winning gun. Stefan crewed by Per Nogen and Markus Largerquist have yet again sailed a fantastic series to finish 3rd overall and also take the Corinthian Prize, well done.
Stefan and his “Still Crazy” team power into 3rd place on the final day of racing in Cascais.
So the championship came down to the final race (race 6 of the series), I spoke with Pedro Andrade, tactician on “Pow Wow” GER 1123, Pedro explained, “In the 5th race we arrived too early at the start and had to circle the committee boat, which meant we started 25 secs late! However, we caught some early wind shifts on the first beat and soon made a fantastic recovery” He continued, “By finishing 3rd, just ahead of Klaus it gave us confidence for the final race. Both sides of the beat were paying depending on the shifts, we started well in the last race and won!” This victory gave the POW WOW team the overall title & you can see from the opening photo how happy they were 🙂
This left GBR 758 “Fever” helmed by World Champion Klaus Diederichs, crewed by Jamie Lea and Vicente’ Pinheiro Melo as the runner’s up and very happy to be showing good form so early in the season. Well done gentlemen.
“Fever” GBR 758 in Action, leading the fleet down wind and taking victory in race 4.
In closing this was an excellent event with 6 races out of 7 completed and sailed in super conditions with good winds and blue sky’s… The Vice President of the Club Naval de Cascais, Jose’ Matoso, congratulated all the successful teams and invited more boats to join in the fun for the 5th Winter Series in March and the 20th Juan Carlos Trophy (Grade 1) in April. Will you be there………… ??
Higher, Faster, Longer………….. Stavros.