For 2023 the rules concerning crew on the RC44s have been changed – now it is not mandatory to carry a female crew, but highly beneficial to do so. Until this year most RC44s sailed eight up: the owner-driver, a maximum of four pros with the remaining three required to be ‘amateur’, technically World Sailing Category 1 sailors. Under the latest rule one of the amateur sailors can now be replaced with a pro female sailor in which case the maximum combined crew weight limit is raised to 730kg (for an all-male crew it remains at 680kg). As a result every team this year has at least one female crew or two in the case of Christian Zuerrer’s Black Star Sailing Team, which has Kiwi match racer Celia Willison on bow.
In fact having female crew on board is not a new move on the 44Cup. In recent seasons Aleph Racing has included Lara Poljsak in their line-up, while previously Flavia Tomiselli raced for four seasons with various teams and today is perhaps the class’ most capped female sailor. As a result when the rule came into effect she was quickly recruited into Nico Poons’ Charisma, while Poljsak has remained with Hugues Lepic’s French team.
However the remaining female crew on the RC44s are entirely new to the class, including from highly experienced two time 470 Olympian Federica Salva, who races on Team Nika and another two time Olympic 470 sailor Tina Mrak from Slovenia. In terms of nationality Italy dominates with Salva, Tomiselli and Artemis Racing’s Elisa Mangani, who, like Tomiselli, works in the marine trade in Palma – Tomiselli is a designer for North Sails, Mangani works on business development for Ronstan.
One of the youngest to be signed up is the circuit’s sole Spanish woman, 22-year-old Julia Miñana, who like Salva (who works the bow on the Team Nika Melges 20), was already well known to the crew of her team having had first-hand experience five years ago racing with Peninsula Racing’s team coach Gustavo Martinez Doreste and boat captain German Panei on a J/70. At the time Miñana was in the headlines having been crowned 2015 Optimist European Champion, a regatta in which she topped a fleet of 97 girls, before graduating up to the 420.
Miñana, 22, is just ramping up her sailing again having last year finished her degree in aerospace engineering (a qualification Elisa Mangani also has). However her studies have not yet ended as she is continuing with a Masters on Computational Fluid Dynamics and data analysis – two areas of expertise, along with her sailing background, that she hopes will one day see her signed up to the design team of an America’s Cup campaign or similar. She has already been trialling for the Spanish SailGP team, where her added qualifications over her sailing were put to good use: “It is like you pool your knowledge of sailing and data analysis to make it helpful.” As she holds out for another Spanish America’s Cup team (since the last in 2007), in the meantime she is racing the 44Cup with John Bassadone’s Gibraltar-based team and also races on the successful Swan 42 Pez de Abril, which last season was second at the Swan Worlds and at the Rolex Swan Cup.
To race on Peninsula Racing, she was recruited in November. “I think perhaps it took me one second to decide,” she jokes. While largely a dinghy sailor, she says she knew about the 44Cup thanks to her Peninsula Racing friends at her yacht club. Compared to other keelboats to which she is used, the RC44 is a proper race boat with no compromises in trying to be used for cruising, and with lots to tweak and adjust.
On board Miñana gets to race with some legends. Italian Vasco Vascotto is back in the tactician’s role following his stint with Luna Rossa, while joining the Gibraltar team this year is Spanish 470 Olympic Gold medallist and America’s Cup winner (with Alinghi) Jordi Calafat, who is trimming main. “I am very excited to sail them,” Miñana says. “Vasco and Jordi – they have won a lot. All of the time I am asking them things and I learn a lot. I am very happy.”
A significant issue remains the role of the female crew on board. Clearly the added 50kg is useful but what to do with their hands while on board in a team so well versed and with such a developed play book? On Peninsula Racing, Miñana says “I am multitasking. Upwind I help Jordi with the mainsail and at the mark I help with the sail changes. In the next years we can work [to develop our roles]. Perhaps I can learn how to trim the mainsail. Or maybe I win a lot of money and can buy my own boat!”
While there is some debate over artificially getting women to race on board via rule changes, it has clearly worked in other avenues in sailing such as the Ocean Race and it certainly breaks the chicken-egg scenario where women don’t get invited to sail because they lack experience but can’t get the experience without sailing. “We have to evolve the women in sailing and if you put a woman in the boat it is progress,” says Miñana. “If you don’t push this to happen, it won’t happen. We need a rule now, but perhaps in five years we won’t…”
