Sport
World Match Racing Tour 2008
The Women’s Sailing Cup in Vitoria, Brazil, is the first event of nine of the 2008 World Match Racing Tour (WMRT) season. As with all WMRT events, an impressive slate of 12 skippers and their crews representing America’s Cup teams, top-ranked positions on the ISAF Match Race Ranking List, and up-and-coming aspirants who have won qualifying events are all poised for battling each other for their share of WMRT ranking points and a piece of the US$150,000 prize money purse.
The venue here is a spectacular amphitheater of a small bay enclosed by a long strand of beach in the pre-start area, with a narrow passage at the bay’s entrance framed by two rocky headlands that protrude into the South Atlantic Ocean.
But a unique aspect of this first event of the 2008 WMRT season is the number of aspiring new talent who have just within the last year started their climb through the WMRT ranking list or are brand-new to this top level of the game, having won qualifying events to be here. At 22, Torvar Mirsky (AUS) is one of the youngest skippers on the WMRT, but has competed in three events in the last year, including a 7th place finish here in Vitoria and a 5th place at the Monsoon Cup in Malaysia last November. Also returning is Pierre-Antoine Morvan (FRA) who finished 9th here last year and is ranked 11th on the ISAF world match race ranking list, and Daniel Glomb (BRA), who is an Olympic veteran and this country’s most active match race skipper today, finished 10th. Peter Wibroe (DEN), who finished 2nd in last year’s Danish Open and is 10th in the ISAF rankings, will be here in Vitoria for the first time. Enjoy the show on Yacht & Sail!
