Giovanni Soldini with a Maserati Multi 70 starts in the Rolex Middle Sea Race
Giovanni Soldini and the Maserati Multi 70 team left La Spezia last night for the Rolex Middle Sea Race, organized by the Royal Malta Yacht Club, which will start in Valletta on Saturday 17 October. The historic Maltese regatta officially marks the resumption of the Maserati Multi 70 sports program, which has been on hiatus since February due to the outbreak of the pandemic.
Due to the pandemic still ongoing, Soldini and his crew will not arrive in Malta days in advance as happened in previous editions, but will follow a different program: the Italian trimaran will stop at Marina di Ragusa, Sicily, from where it will depart. to arrive in Valletta a few hours before the start of the regatta. Soldini explains: “Unfortunately, the virus is still a problem and we want to guarantee maximum security, for ourselves and for others. We have agreed with the race organizers that we will arrive in Malta on the morning of the start and will not disembark ashore, thus reducing the risk of contagion.
The Rolex Middle Sea Race has reached its 41st edition: next Saturday at 11.00 local time (9.00 UTC) the first group of the 58 boats entered in the regatta will begin, 11 of which are Italian. The latest echelon to start will be the Maserati Multi 70 and six competing multihulls, including the French Ultim’Emotion 2, an 80-foot maxi trimaran from Antoine Rabaste, and the Australian Shockwave, a 63-foot trimaran with the Jeff Mearing and Scott skipper. Klodowski.
“For this edition of the regatta we will compete in the classic MOD configuration,” explains Soldini. “Work is in progress on the flying appendages: we are developing a completely new configuration, with the latest generation center rudder, daggerboard and foils that will revolutionize the world of ocean flying. The work will take a few more months, so until then we will use the appendices of the MOD. The set-up will therefore be the same as that of the other MOD70 in the race: the Italian Mana, by Riccardo Pavoncelli, with skipper Brian Thompson.
The Rolex Middle Sea Race is not an unknown regatta for Giovanni Soldini and his crew: aboard the trimaran, the Italian team has already participated in the 2016 and 2018 editions, winning the Line Honors in both cases. The multihull speed record belongs to Soldini: in 2016, the Maserati Multi 70 crossed the finish line in 2 days, 1 hour, 25 minutes and 1 second. The absolute record is in place of George David who in 2007, aboard the Rambler maxi monohull, finished the race in 1 day, 23 hours, 55 minutes and 3 seconds.
The course of the regatta begins in Valletta, Malta: approximately 608 miles long, it is a counterclockwise turn to Sicily, passing north of Stromboli, west of Favignana and Pantelleria and south of Lampedusa, before returning to the finish line in Valletta.
