44Cup Marstrand 2025 - Preview
by 44Cup 21 Jun 02:45 NZST
25-28 June 2025
44Cup Marstrand © Nico Martinez / 44Cup
Racing resumes for the 44Cup next week for the third event of the 2025 season in Marstrand, Sweden. Historically this is the most consistently visited venue for the high performance owner-driver RC44 one designs and their owners, which have visited the remote picture postcard island on Sweden's west coast every year since 2011, with the sole exception of 2016.
Once again racing will take place thanks to the help of the Marstrands Segelsällskap yacht club while the event is supported by Artemis Technologies and the Marstrands Havshotell.
Last year's celebrations of the summer solstice Midsommarafton, one of Sweden's principal holidays, took place during the 44Cup Marstrand. On an evening when the sun barely set, the island turned fully festive, with people putting flowers in their hair, dancing around poles, singing and drinking schnapps and consuming the typical Swedish fare of pickled herring and new potatoes.
The RC44 community undertook their own interpretation of the celebrations via an epic party at Marstrand's notorious Society House. This year the 44Cup Marstrand will take place in the week following Midsommarafton, when the island will continue to be strongly in holiday mode.
For this year's event the race schedule has been moved forward by a day so that practice racing will take place on the Tuesday 24 June with racing proper from Wednesday to Saturday (25-28 June).
As to the form going into the mid-way event of the season, at present Vladimir Prosikhin's Team Nika is leading the 2025 44Cup, but by just one point from Nico Poons' Team Charisma. Charisma is the present 'king of Marstrand' having won in Sweden both in 2024 and 2023 and this was despite a change of tactician between these two events. Topping the leaderboard going into the final day Charisma ended up winning the 2024 44Cup Marstand with a race to spare - a rare occurrence in the highly competitive 44Cup fleet.
However during the last event in Porto Cervo, Sardinia, a new dynamic has entered the 44Cup. For the first time in the near two decades it has existed, the 44Cup has father and son teams racing against one another: in Sardinia Swedish class veteran Torbjörn Törnqvist on Artemis Racing found himself competing with the new GeMera team, skippered by his son Markus.
Both boats come with world class crews, Artemis Racing with Hamish Pepper on tactics and GeMera with Francesco Bruni, most recently Luna Rossa America's Cup co-helmsman, calling the shots. Remarkably in Sardinia they finished second and third respectively, their own private competition certainly causing each to up their game.
Torbjörn Törnqvist felt that arriving in Porto Cervo early to get in a couple of training days had helped greatly, but also: "Of course, it's a big inspiration to have Marcus around. I think I have to step up another gear because of progress he's making, which is great. We work very hard to try to get to grips with things that haven't been working - a few things on the boat handling, which we now seem to have solved, so hopefully we can continue to perform consistently."
Meanwhile son Markus was surprised by their third place finish, on their first competitive outing on the circuit and aboard a brand new boat. "It was above all expectations - in the first days we were struggling quite a bit not just with boat speed but boat handling too but we got to grips with that and we ended up performing way better than anyone thought, so it is a positive line for the next event."
This competition is certain to increase with both Törnqvists competing on home waters in Sweden next week. "It almost like a Nordic version of Porto Cervo," mused Torbjörn Törnqvist, comparing Marstrand with the last 44Cup venue on the Costa Smeralda. "Of course, it doesn't have the same elegance, but it has its own charm, with the scenery, the rocks, the islands, etc. And the sailing is always very interesting there, like it is in Porto Cervo. It's very appealing and we really look forward to it, as I always do."
For son Markus, he has raced with his father in Marstrand before but this will be the first time racing against him in Marstrand but on home waters in front of a home crowd it will be interesting to see if the Törnqvists can repeat their exceptional performance in May.
At present the long term forecast for the 44Cup Marstand is showing big breeze for the practice days and winds ranging from the mid to upper limits for the four race days. With the RC44 fleet back up to being the largest it has been in years, the event is lining up to be a memorable one.