32nd Lake Garda Optimist Open at 2nd World Youth Sailing Week Overall
by Elena Giolai 21 Apr 2014 08:16 BST
12-20 April 2014
Davide Duchi sailing for the Fraglia Vela Riva wins the 32nd edition of the Meeting del Garda Optimist. The winner in the cadet fleet is Francesco Novelli from the Fraglia Vela Malcesine.
Always a big party, the regatta which has taken the Guiness World Record for the biggest fleet ever has once again drawn together 834 young sailors from 36 different nations. In addition the 2nd World sailing week has hosted another 200 sailors in the various disciplines that this regatta encompasses, 29er, Techno 293 and Laser all of whom finished their various competitions yesterday.
Emotions were running high for the 2nd World Youth Sailing Week with the conclusion of one of the four events that comprise this event. The 32nd Meeting del Garda Optimist dedicated to youngsters of between 9 years old and 15 who sail in the Optimist class was the inspiration for this week dedicated to Youth sailing in the north of Lake Garda organised by Vela Garda Trentino sailing club, and involving the Fraglia Vela Riva, Lega Navale Italiana, Circolo Vela Arco, Circolo Surf Torbole and Fraglia Vela Malcesine.
This event has concluded the 10 days of racing across 4 events in what could be considered excellent conditions taking into account the number of races run the manner of their happening, the weather which has for the main part been excellent and also because in the final count a good number of Italian sailors have finished on the podium.
Final victory in the 32nd Meeting del Garda Optimist for Italian sailors and especially the locals on this day of fluky winds which started from the North and then swung to the south in time for the ultimate race for the Juniors. The conditions were tricky to interpret and definitely gave the local sailors an edge.
In the final race of the Junior fleet and, the ninth race in this event, the Fraglia Vela Riva sailor Davide Duchi came out top of the 625 competitors who had signed up. He will now see his name inscribed in the white gold of his medal like many of his predecessors who have gone on to become Olympic competitors and champions. Great satisfaction for the organising sailing club, the Fraglia Vela Riva who can add his name to their previous champions who were Cecilia Zorzi in 2009 and Fabio Zeni in 2002.
Davide Duchi, who is already world champion runner-up in the Optimist class a position which he achieved in the worlds last summer, was able to pull out a lead of a few points after the sailing on Saturday. The fluky winds of the first race today gave him some trouble however and he finished the first race of the day in 73rd place, this result he was luckily able to discard as it was his worst finish in the event so far.
Video in Italian
In the last race of the day however with a more constant south wind blowing his superiority was able to come to the fore and he displayed a great deal of character and determination to win the race with relative ease and add his victory in this event to his already impressive sailing curriculum. In the end he won by a comfortable margin of six points.
A big leap forward was made by the Swedish sailor Lucas Bergstrom saw him take the silver position after a first place in the penultimate race and bronze was taken by the Russian sailor Danill Krutskik who had very similar results to Duchi in today's races with a 77th and a 2nd.
An excellent fifth place went to the other Italian Luca Valentino (CV Cesenatico), in addition some of the other Fraglia Vela Riva sailors filled some of the top positions with Guido Gallinaro seventh, Alberto Tezza tenth and Andrea Spagnolli eleventh. Twelfth place was taken by the Sicilian Salvo Sciuto (NIC Catania). Other top places were taken by sailors from Germany, Denmark, Russia, Lithuania and Sweden.
In the girls event victory went to the Russian Novikova who was in 23rd place overall followed by the Italian Arianna Passamonti (NC Castelfusano) in 25th place. Third in the girls category was the Swedish sailor Lohr.
Cadets
There were six races raced in the cadet category and the battle for the podium carried right through to the very last puff of wind. Always thereabout from the very beginning was Francesco Novelli (Fraglia Vela Malcesine)who like Davide Duchi suffered a slight hitch in the penultimate race with a 63rd place. He regained his composure however in the last race and came back with a very good fourth place this despite his parity with the German sailor Neszecsko was enough to secure him final victory in a fleet composed of 204 sailors from the age of nine to eleven. It was an excellent regatta for Gaja Pelà, who was always in first position amongst the girls and finished in third place overall.
All results from World Youth Sailing Week can be found here.
www.velagardatrentino.com