Dubai: The Messe Frankfurt Sailing Team took the honours in the first two in-port races in this year’s EFG Sailing Arabia The Tour in Doha on Wednesday, but EFG Bank (Monaco) retained the overall lead.
EFG Bank won the first leg of the region’s only long-distance offshore sailing race from Bahrain to Doha, but their lead has now been whittled down to just 0.5 points thanks to the efforts of Marcel Herrera and his young UK team aboard Messe Frankfurt.
Messe Frankfurt led round the first mark in race one and, although they only won the race by 21 seconds from EFG Bank, they went on to repeat the performance in race two, but this time with just three seconds between the leading boats.
Herrera said: “I am really, really proud of the guys because we definitely feel we had the edge on speed. We were really ready for the in-port racing because the guys were really switched on after the previous day’s performance. We all really wanted it and we all did our best.”
Held from February 9 to 24, EFG Sailing Arabia The Tour offers 15 days of intense sailing with a mix of in-port and offshore races to test the skills of the region’s best sailing talent and a selection of elite world class sailors.
The 760-nautical mile course spans four countries from Bahrain to Oman, with eight of the region’s premier marinas playing host as stopover venues during the seven legs of the course.
