It is a clearer morning around the Audi MedCup dock and out on the rade Sud where the Marseille Trophy is poised to start with three races for the TP52 Series fleet and the practice race for the GP42 Series
TP52 Quantum Racing in the Vieux Port, Marseille, with a backdrop of Notre Dame de la Garde. 14 06 2010 Marseille Trophy - Audi MedCup Circuit © Guido Trombetta_Studio Borlenghi/Audi MedCup.
by Sabina Mollart-Rogerson
The rain has moved off for the moment and it is expected that we will see somewhere around 7-11 knots of wind from the SW, backing to SE, possibly dropping slightly during the early afternoon and moving more to the left, building again later.
Emirates Team New Zealand (NZL) go out today with a 20 points lead in the TP52 Series and set up their winning run here last season. Second on the standings is Audi A1 powered by All4One (FRA/GER). There is a great air of anticipation around the dock, but some of the teams may be feeling a little fatigued due to the intensive schedule as the various international regattas dovetail with one another. Maybe the first days will be easier to sustain the tempo, but could this be a factor this week?
Audi MedCup TV will broadcast the action live on www.medcup.org as from 1300h CET.
Stephane Kandler (FRA), owner Audi A1 powered by ALL4ONE (FRA/GER):
"After Cascais’s second place the team is feeling good and quite confident but it will be hard to reproduce the same kind of result here, but we have good reasons to be confident but maybe it will be harder for us in the lighter winds.
"Like other teams there is some fatigue around because we have been on the water racing for the last five weeks in a row."
Paul Cayard (USA) tactician Artemis (SWE):
“We are not really so concerned about the breeze, like anyone else we are just hoping there is some nice breeze, but we aren’t so worried because I don’t think we really have a favourite conditions, but it looks like there will be some breeze Saturday and Sunday.”
“This is my eighth week in a row and I’m counting down the days. We have to just suck it up a bit this week. We have talked about it a little bit as there are a number of us who have been on the eight week tour. We are going to grunt up and put it out one more time.”
Guillermo Parada (ARG) skipper Matador (ARG):
“We are looking forward to this regatta, trying to improve our result of Cascais. We are very close to everyone except Team New Zealand.
"We had two very bad days in the middle of the regatta in Cascais we tried to rcover and actually sailed a lot better in the last race. So we finished very close after the last race and left having felt we had achieved something even if the result was not so good, staying close on points.
"Having Vasco (Vascotto) on board is a natural choice after Santi had to leave us we had to do something. He is Latin and is close to Ceccho (tactician Francesco Bruni) and they have a good relationship and he knows the class.
"The bottom line is that we did not sail well in Cascais and we are here to improve.”
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