The Cervantes Trophy race is the Royal Ocean Racing Club’s first offshore race of the season and has attracted a fleet of 52 boats. Starting at 0800 from Cowes, Isle of Wight, on Saturday 1^st May the fleet of offshore racing enthusiasts are likely to experience a west, south west airflow around force 4. This will produce a spinnaker start from the Royal Yacht Squadron starting line as they progress Eastwards down the Solent to finish in Le Harve.

Five nationalities are contesting the race with entries from Poland, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, France and the U.K and ten boats racing 2 handed. One of the favourites for an overall win is the veteran RORC offshore racer Piet Vroon from Holland in his Kerr 46 ‘ Tonnerre de Breskens 3’. Piet’s goal is to win the RORC season’s points championship which is made up of 12 races including the Round Ireland Race and the Sevenstar Round Britain and Ireland Race. Piet and his crew will be pushed hard by the 2009 RORC Yacht of the Year the Reflex 38 Puma Logic, now called ‘Visit Malta Puma’ with Philippe Falle as skipper.

However the condition should suit the bigger boats with Nigel Passmore’s TP52 ‘Apollo’ and the British Keelboat Academy TP52 ‘John Merricks II’ likely to be fighting for the honour of being first across the line and with a very good chance of winning on handicap as the wind is expected to drop early Sunday morning however if the strong Northerly airflow that is set to envelop the U.K over the Bank Holiday weekend arrives sooner than forecast the overall winner could well be one of the small boats and Christopher Opielok in his Corby 36 ‘ Rockall III’ with a strong performance at the RORC Easter Challenge is hoping the forecast will work in his favour.

The RORC Commodore Andrew McIrvine will be sailing his new First 40 ‘La Response’ and will want steady wind conditions for the whole of the race.

“This design is a proven winner having won the ‘2009 Rolex Sydney Hobart Race” said Andrew “so if the wind does not play tricks on us we have a good opportunity to win overall. However the boat is new to us and this is our first offshore race in her so we will be learning all the time and I am delighted that we have such a big and competitive fleet to test our skills against”

On Sunday 2^nd May the fleet have the opportunity to race back to Cowes with a race for ‘the Trophée Guillaume Le Conquérant” organised by the Société de Regates du Havre in association with the RORC and the Island Sailing Club.