ONE MONTH TO GO
Exactly 30 days until the inauguration of the 37th America’s Cup
On August 22, 1851, with the renowned race around the Isle of Wight, the America’s Cup was born and on the same exact day, 173 years later, the curtain will rise on its 37th edition in Barcelona. With exactly one month remaining until the start of the event, the tension is palpable among the six teams (five Challengers and the Defender) who will compete for the world’s oldest sporting trophy, and Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli is no exception: after over three years of work, the Italian team is looking forward to getting back on the water and facing its opponents, starting with the Final Preliminary Regatta, the first to be raced on AC75 class boats.
Practicing in Barcelona already since late May, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli has been taking advantage of every useful day to train with its latest generation foiling monohull, while simultaneously pursuing the development of the boat and the training of the youth and women’s teams ahead of the Puig America’s Cup and the UniCredit Youth America’s Cup. «This is a good, close-knit and competitive group that has integrated well with the rest of the team», says Max Sirena, Skipper and Team Director of Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli. «The program dedicated to youth and women is very important; these sailors represent the future of Italian sailing and we are eager to put them in the conditions to perform at their best during the regattas».
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During the sailing sessions the team had the opportunity to fine-tune its boat, implementing new solutions or refining existing ones, and to perfect the maneuvers, simulating pre-start and race tactics. On board the sailors continued their rotation to finalize the crew assignments.
With the shared espionage Recon program over, teams are now studying each other, trying to assess their unofficial ranking within the fleet and what secrets their opponents may be hiding. The Barcelona racecourse turned out to be less predictable than expected, but the Italian challenger still came to terms with its renowned wave condition to use it to its advantage. About this past period, Sirena draws a very positive balance and looks ahead with optimism and confidence: «Every time we go out we become more familiar with the boat, the goal is to constantly improve. We have to keep the level of concentration and tough competitiveness high at all times, so that when we sail we are 100 percent focused, as if we were racing and not training. Every day we try something new on board, even if it is not always something visible from the outside, because the development will continue until the last day of racing».
