Surprise victory:

Italian Youngster Alberto Menegatti leads after the second day

On the second day of the Windsurfing Euro-Cup in Cagliari the wind provided
perfect racing conditions for the racers in the Bay of Poetto Beach Sardinia.
The sunshine heated up the land around Cagliari and the thermic induced a nice
southern breeze of up the 15 knots. At 13:30 the race was started.

The Italian Youngster Alberto Menegatti (ITA-456, Starboard, YES Sails) had
a killer port tack start and managed to lead the fleet on the upwind. He was
the first to round the upwind mark in front of the Polish hotshot Michal Polanowski
(POL-16, Starboard, Neil Pryde), Aleks Grynis (POL-86, Starboard, Neil Pryde)
and the current leader of the Euro-Cup Steve Allen (AUS-0, Fanatic, Neil Pryde)
from Australia.

The positions didn’t change on the first downwind. But on the second upwind
Wojtek managed to pass Michal and Aleks to move on the second position. But
Alberto was fully fired up and made the best out of his good start and first
round. He was definitely the fastest guy in this race and rightfully took the
victory today. The Italians got incredible enthusiastic over the victory of
their young talent.

Wojtek Brzozowski finished on the second place in front of Aleks Grynis who
managed to slip past Michal Polanowski on the last lap. Italians number one
Andrea Cucchi (ITA-1, Starboard, Neil Pryde) presented again his great performance
with a 5th place in front of the three top riders of the Fanatic team: Ben van
der Steen (NED-57, Fanatic, Neil Pryde), Roy van Koolwijk (NED-97, Fanatic,
Neil Pryde) and the Euro-Cup Champion 2002 Steve Allen who lost several places
on the second lap. Ross Williams (GBR-83, Starboard, Gaastra) and Jakub Gudzek
(POL-41) completed the top-10 in the men’s fleet.

In the women’s fleet the favourite Dorota Staszewska (POL-1, Starboard,
Gaastra) took advantage out of the absence of her main opponents Christine Becker,
Christine Johnston and Lucy Horwood and managed a clear start-finish victory.
The Italian hero Verena Fauster (ITA-31, Starboard, Gaastra) was able to win
the second place in front of Margit Germany (AUT-88, Starboard, Gaastra). The
Cagliari local Simona Ferrari (ITA-559, Starboard, Gaastra) was able to defeat
Katarina Urbanija (SLO-24, Starboard, Gaastra).

After this race the wind dropped down again so that no more competitions were
possible today. We hope for some more races on the final day on Saturday. Competitions
can be run over the whole day. The prize giving will be in the evening at the
big beach party at Poetto Beach here in Cagliari.

You can find more information, results, pictures etc. and follow the competitions
online on the official Website of the Windsurfing Euro-Cup www.euro-cup.org
and on the FW Class Website www.formulawindsurfing.org .