After a light wind 44Cup Nanny Cay concluded the 2024 season, it was with great anticipation that the 44Cup teams awaited 2025’s opening event in the British Virgin Island, for which stiff trade winds have been forecast for some days.

Unfortunately on this, the opening day of the event and the start of the 2025 44Cup season, the easterly trade winds proved too much. With 25 knots considered the maximum in which the nimble RC44 one designs can race, the wind strength hovered around 25-26 knots for the entire time the race committee boat was on station out in the St Francis Drake Channel.

However the onset of a front, bringing with it 35+ knot winds, was too much and at 1300 local time the race committee from the Royal BVI Yacht Club and the 44Cup’s PRO Maria Torrijo made the tough decision to hoist the AP over A flag and cancel racing for the day.

Torrijo explained: “It has been very windy the whole day and now there is a storm passing through with a lot of clouds and rain and windy with 25-28 knots, gusting to more than 30. So we have cancelled the day. For tomorrow we are happy because we think the wind will drop a little bit and we will have very good racing.”

Michele Ivaldi, tactician on Aleph Racing, the defending champion here in Tortola felt the race committee had made the right call: “Yesterday it was three or four knots lighter than today and it was already marginal then. The problem here is the chop: The waves are steep and short, so it’s very hard upwind, and even downwind the boat starts to sink in the waves in front which puts a lot of load on the rig. So for the first day of the event, it was probably the right thing to do – I think they made the right call. Tomorrow it’s slightly lighter, but not much. The full regatta will be at the top of the range, so it will be fun for everyone.”

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