Maserati Multi 70
Giovanni Soldini conquers the Fastnet Original Course record of 595 miles in 23 hours, 51 minutes and 16 seconds
Giovanni Soldini’s Multi 70 Maserati crossed the finish line of the original Fastnet course on May 8 at 19:14:11 GMT (21:14:11 Spanish time), setting a new record time: 595 miles from Cowes to Plymouth. in 23 hours, 51 minutes and 16 seconds, at an average speed of 24.94 knots. The previous record of 25 hours, 4 minutes and 18 seconds, at an average speed of 23.73 knots, was set by Peter Cunningham’s MOD70 PowerPlay just a month ago. The new record is subject to ratification by the World Sailing Speed Racing Council.
The Italian trimaran crossed the starting line off Cowes on Friday, May 7 at 19:22:55 GMT heading west. The first part in the Solent was slow, but soon after the wind got stronger. Soldini said: “It was tough, sailing to Lizard Point the wind was very strong; we sailed for hours at 34/35 knots; it was great. From there we sailed on a cross to the Fastnet, with 25/30 knots of wind.
During the morning of yesterday, Saturday, we passed the Fastnet and while we were sailing back towards the finish line we encountered some unexpected light winds, but that did not affect us in the final result thanks to the advantage accumulated during the night. We are very happy, this weather window was not perfect, but we wanted to try it anyway and we succeeded ”.
This is the third victory for Soldini and his crew, who are ending a record season in the English Channel with rich loot. The Italian team arrived in Cherbourg, in northern France, on April 11, ready to set sail whenever the ideal weather windows arrived and, in just four weeks, they conquered the three records they had in their sights: Plymouth – La Rochelle. (12 hours, 15 minutes, 21 seconds), Cowes – Dinard (4 hours, 30 minutes, 49 seconds) and the Fastnet Original Course (23 hours, 51 minutes, 16 seconds).
For this record, along with Giovanni Soldini aboard the trimaran were sailing: Guido Broggi, Carlos Hernández Robayna, Oliver Herrera Pérez, Gerardo Siciliano and Matteo Soldini.
With these three new records, the Multi 70 Maserati proclaims itself a “laboratory ship” dedicated to innovation, in which the engineers of the Maserati Innovation Lab in Modena work hand in hand with the Giovanni Soldini team to closely analyze the performance of the trimaran and to be able to find cutting-edge solutions to reach even higher speeds. In this regard, Soldini commented: “We took advantage of this record attempt to test a new rudder that we studied and developed in recent months, and the result was fantastic!”
