Team Basilica VX40 to take part in Round the Island Race
by Ben Faber 10 May 2006 15:58 BST
Fresh from a successful week’s racing in Baltimore, Team Basilica, the British team flying high in the Volvo Extreme 40 Grand Prix series, has announced it is to take on another challenge – the JPMorgan Asset Management Round the Island Race. The prestigious race, established in 1931, takes place on 3rd June and attracts a world class field which this year includes Mike Golding’s boat “Ecover” amongst others.
Basilica is the first of the Volvo Extreme 40 teams to announce an entry into the race, and the presence of the state of the art, high speed catamarans, designed by Yves Loday and created by Mitch Booth especially for the VX40 Grand Prix series, is sure to generate a lot of excitement and speculation that the all British entry could break the record race time of 3hr 8min 29sec set in 2001 by ‘Eure et Loir’.
Basilica, the only British owned, sponsored and crewed boat taking part in either the Volvo Ocean Race or the Volvo Extreme 40 Grand Prix series, had another strong week’s sailing in the third leg of the VX40 Grand Prix series in Baltimore at the end of April, with three individual wins helping them to a third place finish. The results followed on from a spectacular performance in the second leg in Rio in March, where a total of seven race wins saw Basilica win the Rio trophy. The Hayling Island based team sit in second place overall in the VX40 series standings, six points behind Tommy Hilfiger with all still to play for. The next leg takes place in Portsmouth from 27 May – 3 June where Basilica will hope to hit top spot in the series.
Team Director for Basilica, Robin Gray, said of the team’s Round the Island Race entry:
“The Round the Island Race is one of the most prestigious races in the sailing calendar and it is our ambition to leave Basilica’s mark on the 2006 event. We hope to build upon our domination and victory in the last leg of the VX40 Grand Prix in Rio, by winning the next stages in Baltimore and Portsmouth before turning our attention towards the Round the Island Race. We have been extremely fast over the last few months and we will do everything we can to set a new race record in the ‘Basilica’”.
Global IT solutions provider Basilica has had a long standing commitment to sailing which has evolved over 5 years. On 8 – 9 April it added to that commitment by sponsoring the Basilica Optimist National Club Team Racing Championships which was held at Burghfield Sailing Club. Previous sailing sponsorships have included the Global Challenge, a Fast Net race boat and an entry in the Round Britain and Ireland race.