Black Star, Aera and Aurum are the first leaders of the 54 Trofeo Princesa Sofía

The one-design competition got underway this Friday with two races for the Cape 31, Dragon and 6 Metre classes. On Saturday the ORC cruisers will join the fleet on the Bay of Palma.

The Swiss boat Black Star, owned by Christian Zuerrer, in the Cape 31; the Greek boat Aera, owned by Foti Lykiardopulo, in the 6 International Metres; and the Spanish boat Aurum, owned by Tanit Cabau, in the Dragon, are the first leaders of the 54 Trofeo Princesa Sofía Mallorca by FERGUS Hotels, which started out of the Real Club Náutico de Palma (RCNP) for the first day of competition for the one-design classes. The race began in very complicated conditions, a light unstable breezes.

Despite this, the teams were able to complete two races for each of the classes.  The fleet left the pontoons of the RCNP at 12:00 hours but there was an initial delay until around three o'clock in the afternoon. A breeze oscillating between 6 and 9 knots of Mistral finally established itself and it proved just enough to get the Sofía under way. At the end of this first race, with the wind vane pointing northwest again and the anemometer reading 10 knots, the Committee ventured to start a new race. Although the wind eased halfway through the course and there were some shifts in the middle of the race course, all the boats managed to cross the finish line.

Cape 31s make their debut

All eyes were on the Cape 31 class, the flourishing one design which is  making its debut in the Trofeo Princesa Sofía Mallorca by FERGUS Hotels. It is a modern, light, powerful race boat, with lines not dissimilar to those of a TP52 with seven crew members. As is usually the norm in real time racing, the differences are minimal and are marked by the work of the crew, both in the manoeuvres and in the tactical decisions. Black Star, with a third and a first, leads the provisional classification, closely followed, just two points behind, by Richard Goransson's Shotgun and Michael Berghorn's German Halbtrocken 3.1.

In the 6 Metre International class, the Greek boat Aera managed to gain a valuable 3pts margin  points over her compatriot Delphina, of Stratis Andreadis, thanks to her two second places, while in the Dragon class, Aurum, with two first places, gave no option to her closest rival, the also Spanish Mr. Nova, of the RCNP commodore, Jorge Forteza, who had to settle for a third and a second place.

The weather situation is expected to be very different for the second day of competition, when the ORC cruisers are scheduled to join in: the forecasts predict very strong winds, with gusts that could exceed 40 knots from the northwest. The organisers are awaiting the evolution of the front before deciding whether to postpone the races until next Sunday.

The monotype and ORC cruiser competition, which brings together 57 boats, serves as a prologue to the Olympic class regatta, which this year will see the participation of almost 800 boats from 54 countries in ten classes and which will begin next Monday. The 54 Trofeo Princesa Sofía Mallorca by FERGUS Hotels for monotypes and cruisers will conclude on Sunday, 30 March, giving way to the spectacle of the Olympic classes over six intense days.

The 54 Trofeo Princesa Sofía Mallorca by FERGUS Hotels is jointly organised by the Club Nàutic S'Arenal, the Club Marítimo San Antonio de la Playa, the Real Club Náutico de Palma, the Real Federación Española de Vela and the Federación Balear de Vela, with the support of World Sailing, and is co-financed by the Govern de les Illes Balears' Sustainable Tourism Tax fund.

The event is part of the Sailing Grand Slam 2025, along with the Semaine Olympique Française, the Dutch Water Week, the Kieler Woche and the Long Beach Olympic Classes Regatta.