Addeco Maxi OD - Cowes Week Event Day 3

SKANDIA BY A SHORT HEAD

Ludde Ingvall's Skandia (EUR) won the third race of the Cowes Week event in the Adecco World Championship for the Maxi-One-Design class, but it was a hard fought victory with pressure on the leader until she crossed the Royal Yacht Squadron finishing line. Throughout the race, Skandia had been under attack, first from Le Defi Bouygues Telecom - Transiciel, steered by Jimmy Pahun (FRA), and then by Geoff Meek's Rainbow Magic (RSA).

The 30 mile race was held mostly in the Eastern Solent under grey skies in 16 knots of south-easterly breeze which veered to the south. That tendency showed on the first leg, a beat out to the Warner buoy in Spithead, when boats which worked the right hand side of the course reaped the benefit of the change in wind direction.

Only seven boats answered the starter's gun - the missing boat was Ross Field's RF Yachting (NZL) which was damaged in a collision with Gunnar Krantz' Team Henri-Lloyd on Monday. It was in a boatyard in Hamble for repair as the condition of the damage had deteriorated during yesterday's race. Field is to apply for average points for the race he has missed.

When the brass cannon at the Royal Yacht Squadron boomed out, the boats were lined up with Hans Bouscholte's Synphony (BEL) and Team Henri-Lloyd at the windward end of the line, with Skandia just to leeward. At the far end of the line, Rainbow Magic, Le Defi Bouygues Telecom - Transiciel and Ernesto Bertarelli's Alinghimax were close together.

Skandia quickly worked her way to the front of the fleet and began a controlling operation from that moment, putting in covering tacks on first one opponent and then another. Both Skandia and Le Defi Bouygues Telecom - Transiciel appeared to point slightly higher into the wind than the rest and this put them in first and second place around the Warner buoy.

There was a five mile run to Browndown buoy where the order was the same but the French boat had closed to within 20 seconds of Skandia, with Rainbow Magic another 20 seconds astern. The pecking order seemed established, but on the next beat, Skandia fought off the challenge of the French to such an extent that the South African boat slipped through to second place.

'That was not part of the plan,' said Ingvall, 'we rate the South Africans highly after their win yesterday and we knew they would be tough.' Just how tough was to be proved later in the race when they were running back in the area of Browndown. 'They might well have passed us,' continued Ingvall, 'They gybed right on our wind and I thought they would go ahead, but they put a hole in their spinnaker and had to peel to another one. That took the pressure off us.'

'I think we were quite lucky to win this race,' added Ingvall, 'I feel very old today. This race has given me grey hairs. The way they came back at us was impressive. They were faster than us today.' Skandia will come out of the water tonight for a keel inspection. She bumped the bottom a mile from the finish of yesterday's race and Ingvall and his crew suspect that the damage is rather more than simply a scratch .

Further back down the fleet, there was a great race for fourth place between Guido Maisto's Seac Banche (ITA), Synphony and Alinghimax. It was resolved right on the finishing line with Seac Banche beating Synphony by two seconds.

Finishing order (Race three):

1. EUR  Skandia  Ludde Ingvall
2. RSA  Rainbow Magic  Geoff Meek
3. FRA  Le Defi Bouygues Telecom - Transiciel
4. ITA  Seac Banche  Guido Maisto
5. BEL  Synphony  Hans Bouscholte
6. SUI  Alinghimax  Ernesto Bertarelli
7. SWE  Team Henri-Lloyd  Gunnar Krantz

Points after three races:

1. EUR  28
2. RSA  19
3. NZL  17.25
4. BEL  17
5. FRA  15
6. SUI  11
7. ITA  9
8. SWE  7