J/80 ECC VIVIENDAS Winning
(Santander, Spain- Sept 19-20)- The Federation Cantabra de Vela is hosting the Central Optica Trophy series for the twenty-one boat J/80 fleet, racing on the spectacular setting of Santander Bay, sight of this year's record 133 boat J/80 World Championships. The leader of this fall series classic is the J/80 team of BANCAJA raced by Javier Lopez-Vazquez.
The Santander J/80 class raced the second of three parts of their series this weekend under very gusty west wind conditions, with ginormous changes of strength and direction that allowed two long races with three-times around windward-leeward legs. The tidal currents helped some of the racers, like BANCAJA and ECC VIVIENDAS, ride favorable currents up inside the Santander Bay to the Moors. The two races were won by the ECC VIVIENDAS team of Pichu Torcida and his skipper Pablo Arrarte. Second for the weekend was BANCAJA raced by Javier López-Vázquez and his skipper Alvaro Mazarrasa, strengthening their overall series lead. MAQUECHE sailed by Alfonso Pascual ended up finishing third for the weekend. After sailing well on the first weekend, NEXTEL's Ignacio Camino had a relatively poor showing to lose the lead after the first weekend.
Currently, the standings for the series after six races and one discard is Jose Lopez-Vazquez's team on BANCAJA by just two points over Ignacio Camino's NEXTEL and Pichu Torcida's team on ECC VIVIENDAS. Next weekend completes the series for the Central Optica Trophy where tough competition is sure to breakout amongst these top three teams who collectively have a sizable lead (by ten points) over the rest of the fleet.
