The Marina Militare Nastro Rosa Il Veloce came as a bit of a surprise to me. It was only two weeks before the event that a free spot became available. Jim Driver, director of the Griffin programme, asked if someone wanted to do the race and I volunteered. I came into the qualifying rounds with low expectations owing to the last-minute nature.
The qualifiers consisted of a day race and an overnight race, both approximately six hours racing. Thanks to Caitlin Vinicombe for volunteering, equally as last minute, to make up our double handed team for the qualifiers. Our first race was a day race, followed by an overnighter a day later. We came together well and produced some good sailing and tactical choices finishing our qualifying in joint first position in our group.
For the final, I teamed up with Joss Creswell, also from the Griffin project. I had never met Joss before and we had two days preparation for a 12-day race. Talk about in at the deep end!
The first night was a light slow stretch out towards the first gate at Pisa. We made similar speed but didn’t find ourselves in the best position. The wind built into day two and we were in a close battle rising from sixth to fourth place, but then in the second night we made a great call tacking up under the island of Elba and getting a great layline. In the morning, we loaded the tracker and found ourselves in first place, not bad for a night’s work! The next leg was tricky. We had a dropping wind, a lot of rain and many wind shifts but we managed to keep the damage limitation low and held first place gaining about a mile and a half on the French by the Gulf of Gaeta. We made a great decision of tacking away from a rain cloud and the French got stuck. Our lead built to five miles! We sailed a nice beat maintaining distance from second place all the way to the Island of Capri!
By now our first drama of the race had occurred. A diesel leak had caused the diesel to get into the Nutella biscuits! What a nightmare! Nonetheless, we sped away from Capri, building our lead to 15NM, towards Stromboli. However, the next day as we approached Stromboli a real disaster struck. We went to hoist our new kite and the autopilot bore away, then tried to head up again. As we started the hoist the foot of the kite fell over the rail and into the water and we put a foil through the kite! Emotions were low but we cheered up once we saw the bright red lava running down the face of Stromboli, what a sight! We had a nice extension thanks to the wind rounding Stromboli and our lead was up again after a small compression. However, the next leg was tough because the boats behind us rounded Stromboli with a cloud which gave them a great wind shift and they could gain more distance on us and forcing us to sail more distance. Approaching Flavignana, the wind dropped and a navigation error cost us five miles which was annoying but could have been worse as the French put in the wrong coordinates for a mark and that was their race was over!
Luckily, we picked up the wind and took the game offshore searching for more breeze and avoiding a large hole off Sicily. ‘Gin Tonic’ was close on our heels, grinding down the mileage due to their newer kite, but we held them off. We made slow progress but stayed in first place all the way to the second to last gate in Crotone. Unfortunately, we lost the wind just as we passed the gate and got stuck on the outside of the gate. The boats on the inside had the wind fill in allowing them to cut the corner, overtake, and drop us to sixth place! Another wind hole caused a compression of the fleet and all the boats at Luca to park up. It gave us chance for good preparation before the big winds up the Adriatic.
Sailing a good leg, we stayed inshore and picked up a favourable land breeze and went from fifth to second going through the last gate! The game was on. An early gybe cost us, we were lulled into a false sense of security because ‘Yacht Club Italiano’ came with us and I know he is a very good navigator. Again, back into sixth place and after blowing up our A2, all hope was nearly lost but we pushed on. We had to send it downwind super hard through the night, with gusts up to 36 knots in the pitch black, we had the A4 and full main up. We were launched through the sea which was terrible because it was a super sharp chop so the boat was like a submarine! But some nice placed gybes and sticking in the strong wind we got up to third place by day break and it was now the last push. We tried super hard and got within two miles of ‘Gin Tonic’ but then they extended again. For the last night we played it safe and took a wide berth so we would be going downwind for the big winds which never hit us fully, but it was good to be safe as we knew the third place was secured and wanted to keep it.
After 12 days 12 hours and 51 minutes we finished the longest race of my life so far, in fact, double the time of the previous the longest. I really enjoyed most of it, apart from being soaked on the arrival, running out of the tastiest freeze dried by Stromboli and having no sugar snacks after Leuca. Leading for seven days was pretty cool and to finish third was amazing but I was so close to first place, maybe next time. All in all, not bad for my first time racing in a Figaro! Now just have to get over to France to do some proper training, sponsors are welcome to talk to me.
Thanks to Joss for joining me and putting in a great effort. Also, Thanks to Jim Driver and RORC Griffin for supporting us and getting us the entry for the event.
Stay tuned for the next adventure!!
Words by: Zeb Fellows
Griffin Offshore Pathway
Over the years, through Royal Ocean Racing Club members, the Griffin Fund has assisted in providing race boats and experienced sailors to improve young sailors’ understanding of offshore racing. To get involved with the RORC Griffin Pathway as a sailor or supporter visit the dedicated Griffin Pathway Information page.
