The wind absence was the protagonist at the Friendship Cup

written by Matias Collins  on  June 15  of  2025 and read by 371

One of the best shots taken at the previous day
@Andrea Baban

Another summer day, really hot, with a slow morning after a great evening yesterday where a great table was set and a fantastic meal served by the RCNM, with a goat salad as starter, then entrecot and French fries and as dessert profiteroles, water, wine and beer kept coming to a point a bunch of sailors continued the party after the dinner and one drink leads to another and finally they had to stay at the club and sleep in the youth rooms. Probably it was a non-planned snoring festival.

After a long wait the RC decided to try a race, a super short course, after cancelling the scheduled silver fleet race, a light breeze (3-5 knots) with 20-40 angle changes and occasionally a pressure reaching the 8 knots that lasted with luck almost a minute.

The race started anyway, local knowledge was the key, they quickly found the wind and headed to the windward mark, while others were struggling to get at least somewhere.
Amazingly team ESP 1 had everything in control, followed by ESP 4 and then the best team of the qualifying series GER 12, The wind died at the second windward mark, and it came from the side turning the race in a carrousel, ESP 1 who aimed to the center of the finish line on the downwind, finally fell in a wind hole, while ESP 4 and GER 12 each going through the sides passed them, a bitter taste but anyway an improvement from the qualifying series.

ESP 4 Juan Pablo de Diego, Juan Manuel de Diego and Julio Soria became the champions of the 2025 edition of the Friendship Cup in Spain.

GER 12 with Roman Koch, Alex Hasenclever and Guille Parodi ended up finishing second followed by ESP 1 Carlos Elosegui, Joaquin Arisqueta and Juan Ramon Jimenez.
At the prize giving ceremony life member and former ISA president Michael Dietzel thanked the organizers, volunteers and promise that the next time he would have a full crew set, Roman also an ISA committee member also thanked the club and all the great work done by the volunteers, but a special care should be taken to avoid a screw up on the last day as it is the one that sailors tend to remember on their way home.

Tomas Peuvrel, Carlos Elosegui, the key players in the organization already announced that a new edition of the event will come on 2027, possibly with an increased in participation format and number of boats to race.

A special thanks to the event sponsors PL Sails, Comunidad de Madrid and Ayuntamiento de San Martin de Valdeiglesias

Gold Fleet Results

Qualifying Results


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The upwind
@Andrea Baban

The downwind
@Andrea Baban

Images from the previous and glorius day
@Andrea Baban