A 2018 full of regattas for the Vitamina Sailing Team

It’s an intense racing season full of international events that awaits the Vitamin Sailing Team led by PharmaNutra SPA President Andrea Lacorte who, after a significant success in 2017, is getting ready to get back into the game with several important announcements. “The main one is that, after several years of racing, we are leaving the Melges 32 class and moving to the new, largely anticipated Melges 40, a beautiful and very fast boat that will certainly be noticed in the coming years,” explains Lacorte with enthusiasm and the great trepidation we are all sharing as we await the first competition. “The Melges 40 will be the hub for our activity throughout 2018, but we will also be active in other competitions. We have confirmed our commitment in the M32 catamaran circuit, both in the Mediterranean Series we already won last year, and in the North America Series. Next year the European circuit will be even more competitive and exciting, with several innovations including a stage at home, in the port of Pisa. The experience we built up during the last season will be very useful in our effort to repeat this success.”

While confirmation in the M32 catamaran circuit might almost seem obvious, it is quite different with the Melges and the transition to the new, challenging and partly still-to-be-discovered 40-footer – a great and ambitious gamble. “We could continue to race with the 32-footer. It would certainly be easier, considering all the experience we have accumulated over the years; but I like real motivating challenges and the Melges 40 truly offers plenty of those,” says Lacorte. “I’m not a nostalgic guy. I like to face the future, the technology, and the Melges 40 is a modern boat that looks forward, starting with the choice of canting keel. It is currently the most technological One Design boat in circulation. The difference with the other boats is really huge“.

The Melges 40 season will be branded by Cetilar® and will be based in Italy, in the port of Pisa. The action will take place mainly in Spain: after the launch of the boat in Valencia, in mid-February, training sessions and regattas are planned in Palma de Mallorca. Then we will have an event in Porto Cervo (July) and another one in Barcelona (late October), before a possible transfer to Florida for a series of regattas in autumn. On board Vitamina, in regatta for the Yacht Club Repubblica Marinara of Pisa, there will be the crew that raced in the last few years with the Melges 32, starting from the team manager and boat captain Matteo De Luca, plus a couple of high-level new entries: the Slovenian tactician Branko Brncic who will join the helmsman Andrea Lacorte in the cockpit, as well as the grinder Massimo Gherarducci.

Just like the previous years, the M32 catamaran will bear the logo of our SiderAL® brand. Alongside Lacorte and De Luca (respectively helmsman and bowman), just like last year, we will again meet the young Australians Torvar Mirsky and Cameron Seagreen, who became Match Race World Champions at the end of October, in China. “They are strong guys, with a potential still partly to be expressed. Having them back on board is a good move,” explains Lacorte, who is getting ready to face the first regattas of the season in Miami, Florida, where a series of events are scheduled leading up to April. After that, the M32 activity will move to the Mediterranean – including a stage of the circuit in Marina di Pisa, with Cetilar® as main sponsor, as part of the collateral events planned before the 151 Miglia, the famous offshore regatta which attracts 200 boats on the starting line – before the grand finale scheduled in Chicago, between the end of September and the beginning of October, venue of a World Championship that promises to be one of the highlights of the international sailing season.