Weekly round up

Away last week? Then check out what happened last week in international yachting

Last week the south coast of the UK was deserted, as everyone was over in Ireland competing at Ford Cork Week, where competition was set to be lively in the new 'enforced' IRM class for the grand prix boats.

The weekend saw a blinding performance over at the 60ft trimaran Grand Prix in Zeebrugge by Loick Peyron's Fujifilm . On the Saturday in 20-25 knot winds, boats were clocked at 37 knots! There was also a major prang between Bonduelle and Sopra Group .

On Sunday madfor sailing were the first to bring the world the announcement that Pindar girl Emma Richards (left) is to take part in Around Alone, the only Brit and girl to race in this year's singlehanded round the world race. Scotland's answer to Ellen MacArthur will be sailing Josh Hall's Open 60 Gartmore and gave James Boyd her views on singlehanding.

Within days of their last series finishing, the new Swedish Match Tour kicked off with the Tropheo Roberto Trombini in Italy. OneWorld's Australian nipper James Spithill, no doubt thanks to the tutorage of match racing maestro Peter Gilmour, showed form throughout the series and went on to make Danish bacon out of Jesper Radich with a 3-1 win in the final.

The Swedish Match Tour is run by giant international sports marketing company, Octagon. They are unique in having their own sailing department and James Boyd caught up with its head Scott MacLeod to get his take on yachting sponsorship and their future plans for the Tour.

During last weekend's racing RMW Marine continued their dominance of the 18ft skiff circuit , while their absent skipper, Rob Greenhalgh, put in a better day in the Tour Voile , assisted by 49er silver Ian Barker. RMW Marine , helmed by Tim Robinson, went on to win the series. Over in Corpus Christi, Texas, Croatians took the first two places at the conclusion of the Oppie Worlds .



There was something of an Olympic theme to madfor sailing this week following Ben Ainslie's incredible victory in the Finn Europeans , after a mere five months sailing in the class. The Olympic Gold medallist brought us up to speed with how the regatta had gone, his final race contratent with Luca Devoti which saw him protested under rule 69, and what he's up to next.

Elsewhere in the Olympic world Paul Cayard won the star-studded Star Worlds warm up event in LA, Hugh Styles and Adam May, the UK's top Tornado team, reported from Martha's Vineyard where they have been training for their Worlds.

madfor sailing also spoke to 49er sailor Paul Brotherton , about life after his divorce from silver medallist Simon Hiscocks, the 49er Worlds and how he wants to make the move into keelboat racing (he was tactician on Nick Hewson's Farr 52 Team Tonic during Cork Week). He also wouldn't say no to a ride on Ellen's new big cat.

At Ford Cork Week the Farr 40 Too Steamy led the IRM class after the first day. The week was dominated by brilliant sunshine but light, fickle winds. The conditions seemed to favour the IC45s and day two saw Glyn Williams' IC45 Wolf shift into the lead ahead of Chris Little's Bounder . Ben Ainslie rocked into town for the Wednesday to steer Babbelas , and, of course, won that day.

Slightly more breeze on the Thursday and the three Farr 52s came into their own scoring 1-2-3. Peter Harrison's Chernikeef went on to win the final day , but in the final results overall IRM winner was Wolf .

After their visit to Ireland, the third and final leg of the Mini class' Demi Cle, back to Lorient had a female winner in Swede Pia L'Obry and Australian former Amer Too bowgirl Liz Wardley. Wardley described to madfor sailing how they'd got on. While at the time it seemed they were the first women to win a Mini race, in fact it was later pointed out that French yachtswoman Jeanne Gregoire had won the class' Solitaire de Concarneau race in 2000.

The end of the offshore leg to Bayonne and the following day's inshore races made for a game of musical chairs on the Tour Voile's leaderboard . The boats took part in their last Atlantic race before being carted off to the Med overland by lorry.

Throughout the week the Europe Europeans were in full swing. On the penultimate day Finnish sailor Sari Multala appeared to have the event sewn up , and sure enough the next day she won with an impressive 9 points ahead of second placed Dane Trine Julie Adrahamsen on 23.

Meanwhile in Denmark the Laser Europeans were taking place. Early on Team GBR were struggling but later in the week Paul Goodison began to claw his way up the leaderboard and some consistent sailing on the final day saw the top seeded Laser sailor take the bronze spot behind Swedes Karl Suneson and Fredrik Lassenius.

We previewed the British form for the Youth Worlds that were about to kick off in Canada. Plus we had reports from the weekends racing at the Medway Dinghy Regatta at Wilsonian Sailing Club, the Stokes Bay sailor who won the 2002 Dart 18 Dutch Nationals and the B14s at Hayling Island SC.

On the other side of the globe Martyn Riley and his crew on the catamaran Raw Nerve were preparing to make an attempt on the 43 day non-stop round Australia record . Prior to leaving crewman Paul Larsen described their last minute preparations and sent us his first report as they were passing Eden - going to Hobart, the long way!

At the end of the week we spoke to 60ft trimaran designer Marc van Peteghem about how the new foils on 60ft trimarans are becoming so effective that they are causing the leeward float to lift out of the water, but this causes the boat to become highly unstable. In his photos of Michel Desjoyeaux's new Geant Thierry Martinez showed us how the Vendee Globe winner plans to tackle this problem.

Michel Desjoyeaux's new Geant trimaran