Barking Mad takes European title as Enfant Terrible wins Circuit

8:10 PM Sun 16 Oct 2011 GMT

'UNO Farr 40 European Championship 2011' Osman Ugur

In a thrilling conclusion which saw the top two boats heading into the final race of the series tied on points, Barking Mad (USA) has been crowned UNO Farr 40 European Champion 2011.

The boat owned by Jim Richardson and with Hamish Pepper calling tactics secured victory with a storming win in the last race. Second place went to Alberto Rossi's Enfant Terrible (ITA) and Wolfgang Schaefer's Struntje Light (GER) took third.

Richardson, three time Farr 40 World Champion and former Class president was pleased with the level of competition within the fleet: 'The racing was incredibly tight all week; Enfant Terrible, Transfusion, Struntje Light and our boat were neck and neck for quite a while and we went into the last race tied on points with Enfant - who would have won the tie-break as we hadn't won any races - and just 2 points ahead of Transfusion.'

It was only the last downwind leg of the final race that Richardson knew victory was within his grasp: 'We were trailing both Transfusion and Enfant at the top mark. The boats were very close together and when we went down the run they ended up going round the right hand mark, which was the favoured one, and we had to go around the left hand mark. It turned out that we got a really good right hand wind shift and some pressure and got ahead of both of them but it wasn't until we got around the last top mark and set a spinnaker and got a monster puff that we extended our lead quite a bit. It was definitely an exciting event right to the end.'

Transfusion (AUS), owned by Guido Belgiorno-Nettis, took an early lead in the first race of the day and went on to cross the finish line ahead of Nico Poons' Charisma (MON). Enfant Terrible took third place which left them on equal points with Barking Mad overall while Transfusion was just two points behind. The final race of the series was then a four-way battle for the silverware between the American boat and Transfusion, Enfant Terrible and Struntje Light, who despite a deep finish in Race 9 were still in the running for a top spot. Race 10 gave Barking Mad a resounding win ahead of Struntje Light and Transfusion who was later disqualified as the result of a protest and slipped back to fourth place overall.

During the prize giving ceremony Enfant Terrible also received a trophy as overall winner after four events in the Farr 40 European Circuit. Alessandro Barnaba's Fiamma was second and NIco Poons' Charisma third.