Giraglia Rolex Cup

Marco Paolucci's Comet 45S, Tartaruga, has taken overall honours in the Giraglia Race 2008, concluding this year's week-long Giraglia Rolex Cup. The 45-footer completed the 243-mile course in 31 hours, 43 minutes, 27 seconds. Tartaruga won a very close three-way battle on ORC corrected time, beating a Canard 41, Aurora, by just 57 seconds, and third-placed First 44.7 Argo by 2 minutes 13 seconds. Tartaruga wins the title of overall honour due to the fact that more boats were entered in the 88-strong ORC division than the 82 registered in IRC. In the IRC fleet Fissa, an A-40 RC entered by Ettore Yachting, took first place by more than 50 minutes on corrected time ahead of Vinicio Petracchi's Cookson 12M, High Five. Good wind on the final approaches to Genoa benefited the medium-sized boats this year, relegating the Maxis to the minor placings on handicap.

Giraglia Record Smashed!

Neville Crichton has smashed his own course record in the Giraglia Race, after steering Alfa Romeo across the finish line at Genoa at 0803 hours this morning. This means the 100-footer completed the 243-mile course in just over 18 hours, a massive improvement on the record set by Crichton's previous Alfa Romeo, a 90-footer which set a time of just over 22 hours back in 2003.

The New Zealand skipper said they had a good run all the way up to Giraglia Rock, off the northern tip of Corsica, before 'parking up' for three hours. Then the wind filled in again close to the Italian coast and the supremely efficient Alfa Romeo finished off the job.

This is the 56th edition of the Giraglia Race, a 243-mile marathon starting from St Tropez via the Giraglia Rock at the northern tip of Corsica to the finish in the Italian port of Genoa.

Image: New Zealand 2008 Giraglia Rolex Cup © ROLEX/Kurt Arrigo.