Cascais bids farewell to summer with over 200 sailors participating in Cascais Vela
by Press CNCascais 4 Sep 2024 17:43 BST
30 August - 1 September 2024
Cascais Vela 2024 © Neuza Aires Pereira / Clube Naval de Cascais
This Sunday, September 1st, marked the end of another edition of Cascais Vela, a championship that has annually filled Cascais Bay with boats at the end of August for more than two decades, and this year brought together over 200 sailors across five classes.
Friday was the first day of races for the ORC and J70 classes, while the Finn, SB20, and NHC classes joined over the weekend, completing a total of 36 races over these three days, all with strong average winds.
In the cruising category, the big winner in NHC - Marinade Cascais Regatta was Funbel/Nacex, from António Noronha. In the ORC classes, Eagle I, from António Domingues, won the ORC B, and Xekmatt, from Hugo Barrier Henrique, won the ORC A class, also securing the Pedro Mendonça Trophy, awarded to the winner of the coastal regatta held on Saturday.
In the dinghy sailing classes - J70, SB20, and Finn - the victory was closely contested until the end, with the first place in any of these classes being secured by just three points or fewer.
In the J70 - NationalGest Challenge, making their debut in this edition, the winners was Solyd Sailing Team, with Vasco Serpa, Paulo Manso, Bernardo Plantier, and Gonçalo Lopes, after 8 races.
In the SB20 - Astara Challenge, the competition was also tight, with the boat Xcellent, from John Pollard, with the Portuguese Santiago Sampaio and Pedro Costa crewing, securing victory after winning the final race of the championship.
In the Finn class, Jorge Pinheiro de Melo won four of the five races held, thus securing the first place in the classification.
Besides the sailing activity, Cascais Vela also included a program of parallel activities on land and at sea: every day there was a gathering at the club after the races sponsored by Sagres Beer and Opção Global - Normas e Sinais; Sailors For The Sea organized an underwater cleanup that collected more than 100kg of trash, and awarded the event a platinum level - the second highest - for sustainability; and on Saturday night, the legendary Bye Bye Summer party took stage, gathering hundreds at Clube Naval de Cascais until almost dawn, in a traditional "farewell to summer" that celebrated its 23rd anniversary this year.
For Francisco Kreye, councilor of the Cascais Municipal Council - one of the main sponsors of the championship - "the sea festivities and the festivities at the Cascais Naval Club, whether the legendary Bye Bye Summer party or the great Cascais Vela championship, are the crowning of the end of August and signify that it is possible to align the town's festivities with the club's activities, which brings dynamics and liveliness to our town."
The event also had the support of Turismo de Portugal, the Federação Portuguesa de Vela, Marina de Cascais, Astara, NacionalGest, and Vista Alegre, which provided the prizes for the top finishers.
Full results here