(La Punta, Peru)- With spring sailing going full-tilt “down under” the
equator everywhere, it was perhaps the South American J/24 sailors who
were most eager to get the ball rolling in their 2014 South American
Championship hosted by Centro Naval de Peru- Club Nautico. An
enthusiastic group of thirteen J/24s, mostly from Peru and Chile, were
ready to take on the top Brazilian team led by skipper Mauricio Santa
Cruz on his famously-named BRUSCHETTA. Sailing in the spectacular bay surround La Punta, the fleet was treated to excellent sailing conditions all five days of the event with winds averaging around 8-13 kts for the total of ten races. It was a fair test of skills and it was pretty self-evident after the first day of racing that Santa Cruz’s BRUSCHETTA simply had “another gear” and could extricate themselves from difficult situations and still manage to win races. In the end, they were crowned South American Champions after posting a remarkable seven 1st and a 3-4 as counters for a total of 14 pts net.
Behind
BRUSCHETTA, it was a game of consistency and avoiding “the big
mistake”, some teams faired better than others. After day one, the
Brazilian BRUSCHETTA team led the fleet, followed by Luis Olcese’s
SCARAMOUSH from Peru, then Javier Arribas’ WAYRA team also from Peru.
For two more days, the top three didn’t change. Then, disaster struck
the WAYRA team. After posting mostly top three finishes, the WAYRA gang
seemingly “lost the edge” and plunged into the abyss and off the
podium. In their last five races, WAYRA posted a 6-6-10-8-10 to
seriously “fall from grace with the sea,” ending up in 5th overall.On the third day of the regatta, the composition of the top five began to change, with Matias Seguel’s GURU team from Chile getting two 4ths to slide into third by a point to spare. Then, on the final day of racing Saturday, WAYRA continued to be snake-bitten while GURU finished off the series by winning the last race and taking the bronze. The race for the top five was rounded out by Vernon Robert’s Chilean team on JOYITA, taking 4th overall with relatively consistent finishes.
Of note was the continuing improvement of the all-women’s team sailing JITANA, skippered by Tania Zimmerman and her sisters and friends from Peru. While they finished 8th, they managed to post a 1st and 3rd in races #8 and #9. In fact, their 9-3-1-6 in the last four races on the last two days of the regatta was the 5th best in the fleet! Sailing photo credits- Bernardita Grez For Facebook photos & commentary on the J/24 South Americans For more J/24 South American Championship sailing information
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