Sailing: Bekking takes upper hand

A storming display by Volvo race skipper Bouwe Bekking and Volvo aspirant Dirk de Ridder swept them to the top of the leaderboard after the second coastal race of the Breitling Medcup regatta yesterday.

As a replacement Movistar was undergoing trials on the bay after Bekking's 2005-06 version had to be abandoned in the Atlantic, he took the King of Spain's TP52 Bribon into an eight-point lead over fellow Dutchman De Ridder's Mean Machine, while America's Cup skipper Vasco Vascotto put Chile's Mutua Madrileña into third.

But the long-term threat was just behind, Russell Coutts in charge of Sweden's Artemis and Britain's Ian Walker in charge of the Galway-based Patches. "If we hadn't broken our mainsail halyard ahead of Friday's race we would be there or thereabouts," said Walker, adding: "We sailed bloody well to achieve fifth overall today, especially as we chose the right-hand side of the track at the start and it was the wrong way to go. It's going to be a long season."

There had been a hurried justification yesterday morning of a horlicks by the international jury the night before which had first disqualified Artemis from the whole of Friday's race and then reinstated it for the first- half points. There was no explanation, however, about why the ever-so-self-important jury boat, with official privilege flag, had been seen leaving with four of the five jurors on board and then tied up for two hours at a particularly favoured restaurant on the island of Tabarca, which the fleet had to sail around. The fish stew is highly recommended.

None of the 23 yachts had time to stop off yesterday as fast conditions were again in evidence, a 10- to 12-knot southerly pushing them over the 28-mile upwind and down course in just under four hours. The final pair of short races is scheduled today.

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