I am back in Europe for the Princess Sofia Trophy in Palma di Majorca, Spain. Majorca is an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea to the south of France and to the east of the Spanish mainland. The regatta is an ISAF Grade 1 event and part of the fledgling World Cup of Sailing and includes all 11 Olympic Classes plus the invited Dragon class. I am sailing with Hamish Pepper (NZL) while his crew and Andy sail the Americas Cup.

Day one saw light and shifty conditions out on the water and many classes did not even get a race started. The Stars are the largest boat competing so our course was the furthest out to sea and we actually got a nice sea breeze. In the first race the boat end of the line was very favored so Hamish and I battled for a good starting position at that end. We tacked out immediately into clear air and were able to work our way up the right side of the course.

The conditions were very tricky with ocean swells coming from the right and lots of confused waves over the swell. We had to constantly move around the boat to keep it balanced and moving fast. We were able to succeed at keeping the boat going and made it to the weather mark first. The course was short and the wind was light so we were able to stay between our competition and the next mark for the rest of the race to finish first.

In the second race we were favoring starting at the boat again but with 3 min to go, Hamish saw a left shift coming. We sailed down to the opposite end of the line and were able to start and cross the fleet right off the line. The wind picked up and made the racing even more physical as we still and to move with the waves, but now had to hike hard also. We exchanged tacks with the lead pack of six boats for five legs and lost a few right at the finish by over-standing the finish line (sailing past the shortest distance) to finish fifth.

Robert Scheidt won the day with a 2, 2, followed by Pepper/Nichol with a 1, 5 and Matthias from Poland with a 6, 1.

We are scheduled to sail two races a day through Thursday and then the top 10 boats will sail a "medal Race" on Friday. We then take Easter weekend off and stay in Palma to race the Spring Championships of the Eastern Hemisphere next week. You can check out the regatta report and photos from the Expert Olympic Garda on our web site at http://www.HortonNichol2008.com/ and I will try to get some photos of Palma up as soon as I can.

Cheers!

Brad