Spanish Nationals 2012: Report & Results

Photos by Maria Muiña mariaphotos.com – Report below by Adecat.

This last weekend (13-16 September) the Real Club Nautico Sanxenxo was the host for the 2012 catamaran nationals in Spain. The catamaran races (divided in the classes A-class, F-18 and Interseries) were organized in parallel with The Corte Inglés Master 2012 for ORC and classic cruisers. Only a club with an infrastructure like the RCN Sanxenxo is capable of organizing such a big event, attracting sponsors and public and the same time, resulting in a lot of fun in the village after taking down the sails. Thanks again to the organizers and sponsors!

Racing took place in one of the typical Galician rías, submerged river valleys which have left narrow inlets in the Galician costs. These rías provide protected areas perfect for sailing where knowledge of currents and wind patterns are crucial for winning. We have had medium conditions (from 13 to 8 knots) the first day, the RC was able to bring in 4 races, as the forecast for the next days were very light conditions. Unfortunately the forecast was right, and the second and third day only 3 (4 for A-class) more races could be finished with 5-6 knots and even less the last day.

As the conditions changed so did the positions in the different categories.

In A-Class, „Chusco“ Abdón Ibañez scored three bullets the first day on his DNA, giving him a comfortable lead over Kiko Espi and Kike Cornejo, both on DNA. The following days with very light conditions Santiago Nieto on his Flyer I could score three first places, but not enough to get a place on the podium due to his worse performance with the medium conditions during the first day. Finally the first three places were for

1. Abdón Ibañez – RCN Valencia – 10 pts
2. Kiko Espi – RCN Valencia – 15 pts
3. Enrique Cornejo – RCN Barcelona – 16 pts.

In Interseries (category in which we use the SCHRS rating system to compensate time) we had FX-1, Hobie 16 and one Tornado racing against each other. Usually the Hobie-16s form a class on their own, but as the number of participants in the class was not high enough, they sailed in the time compensated class Interseries. The podium resulted to be

1. David de Diago (FX-1) – CN Calafell – 9 pts
2. Phillipe Dupiereux / Manuel Sciarra (Tornado) – CN Altea – 16 pts
3. Marc Jovani / Rocio Piris (Hobie 16) – CN Cullera – 21 pts

The most numerous class was Formula 18 with 29 teams. This steadily growing class in Spain showed to be a playground for olympic ambitions with various mixed teams showing up. Due to the light to medium conditions the F-18s were not overpowered for the lighter teams and some nice racing took place. The medium conditions during the first day gave the leading position to Robert Fijnheer and Peter Stiebler on their Nacra Mk2, followed by Denk/Marmolejo on a C2 and Benitez/Cantero (Wildcat). Fijnheer could not hold his lead with the lighter conditions and the preolympic/olympic mixed team of Toni Rivas and Laia Tutzo showed off their tactical experience. The portuegese Santos/Figueiro also showed very consistent results in the last races, assuring them a final second place, closely followed by Benitez/Cantero:

1. Toni Riva / Laia Tutzo (Shockwave) – C.N. Garraf – Port d´Aro – 23
2. Luis Miguel Santos / Pedro Figueiro – C Vela do Sados (Nacra) – 25
3. Bernardo Benitez / Jose Cantero – RCN Gran Canaria – 27

Full results can be seen here: https://www.rcnsanxenxo.com/img/regatas/Cata3.htm