Porto Cervo, Italy. 8^th September. The fifth and final race of the Maxi Yacht Rolex Cup 2007 saw the fleet head off on schedule this morning in approximately 10 knots of west north-westerly winds.

The Racing division hosted a rarely-seen spectacle as two maxi yachts match-raced their way around the course: Hasso Plattner’s Morning Glory spent the entire 30-mile course marking Stephen Ainsworth’s Loki (AUS) in order to keep the overall lead she had held since yesterday by dint of two first places compared to the equally-scored Loki’s single victory. The strategy proved to be a winning one as the German yacht succeeded in keeping Loki at the back of the fleet and, being able to discard the sixth place she took herself as a result of her tactics, held onto overall victory on countback. Loki came in second and Titan 12 (USA), with Peurto Rico’s Tom Hill at the helm, took third place.

Neville Crichton’s Alfa Romeo (NZL) came in first in both real and corrected time. Tactician on board Alfa Romeo, Olympic sailor Ben Ainslie was pleased with the day’s competition: “It was a nice race today, a good start and a good breeze and like most of the days the wind changed a lot throughout the race and for us it was to the good side for a change, so it’s been a nice race for us and a good way to finish. We had a tough week with being on the back side of a few changes in the wind and it’s nice for us to come good in at the end. At Barettinelli there was something going on with Morning Glory and Loki but our tactics were just to jibe, to have a good race and to finish off with a victory and we hopefully have done it.”

The Wally Class saw Jean Charles Decaux’s J One (GBR) take first place in race five today to leave her two points ahead of Andrea Recordati’s Indio (ITA) overall, with Dark Shadow (GBR) in third place.

The only boat assured of a victory from the offset today was Carlo Puri Negri’s Atalanta II in the Mini-Maxi division. The Farr 72, with Francesco De Angelis calling tactics, held an eight-point lead yesterday and thanks to today’s race qualifying all divisions for a discard, could not be caught. Although Gunter Herz’ Allsmoke (GBR) took a first place today to narrow the gap somewhat, Atalanta still held a comfortable five-point lead. Massimo Violati’s Ops 5 came in third.

Carlo Puri Negri enjoyed the event and is already looking forward to next year. “According to yesterday’s ranking it would have been difficult to change the results in a different way. But as usual it was great racing with a lot of fun, maybe with less steady conditions than in the previous editions. But this is an amazing place, and we are extremely happy. We are now looking ahead to the next edition to come. We will back for sure. Thanks to the organization, they did a very good job and we had of lot fun.” 

In the Cruising Division Ranger continued the week’s trend of just having the edge on fellow J-Class yacht Velsheda (GBR) and took overall victory ahead of her British rival. Arne Glimcher’s Ghost (USA), which had a great week but was unable to recover in the overall classification after suffering technical problems and having to withdraw from the first race, came in third. 

The final prizegiving, in which Rolex timepieces and trophies were assigned to overall division winners, took place in the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda's Piazza Azzurra.

Many of the competing Maxis will be out on the water's off Porto Cervo once again on Monday 10th September as they take part, together with Veteran, International 12 metre, Swan, Southern Wind and Smeralda 888 yachts - to name but a few - in the YCCS 40th Anniversary Regatta.