19th Viareggio Historical Sails Rally Preview
by Alessandro Bagno 10 Oct 18:26 BST
17-20 October 2024
Regate Vele Storiche Viareggio © Foto Maccione
For 19 editions it has become a fixed event for the most important tourist city in Versilia and for dozens of shipowners who do not want to miss their presence.
This year too, from 17 to 20 October, Viareggio will host the Viareggio Historical Sails Rally, organized by the association of the same name together with the Versilia Nautical Club.
Viareggio Historical Sails Rally President Gianni Fernandes recalled how with this 19th gathering the vintage sailing regatta season in the Mediterranean officially ends. Not only that. Every year new boats are hosted, which can be visited on the dock by anyone who wishes to discover a real open-air floating museum up close. If we consider that the oldest participating hull will be Tirrenia II from 1914, launched 110 years ago, and that the most recent is LuluNikka from 2024, a classic wooden construction from the Checchi di Massarosa shipyard, we can say that Viareggio will host over a century of history and evolution of yachting.
The Pandora Traditional Sailing schooner will be made available to a limited number of people who want to follow the regattas from the sea. The event is organized by the FIV (Italian Sailing Federation), which delegates its organization to the affiliates Associazione Vele Storiche Viareggio (VSV) and Club Nautico Versilia (CNV) with the support of the Associazione Italiana Vele d'Epoca (AIVE) and the Committee Mediterranean International (CIM).
The vessel chosen this year as the symbol of the 19th gathering, depicted in the traditional watercolor created by the Genoese painter Emanuela Tenti, will be the centenary Alzavola, an 18.85 meter long Bermudan ketch built in Burmese teak wood in England in 1924.
For fifteen years the boat has belonged to the Roman Claudio Tinari, who, after having taken it over from the Florentine Zaccagni family, subjected it to a restoration carried out by the Cantiere Del Carlo. Today it has also become a symbol of inclusive sailing, because it periodically hosts crews made up of children with different abilities.
The three regattas on the calendar, one a day from Friday to Sunday, can be followed from the beaches just as happens in this period in Barcelona on the occasion of the America's Cup. The program at sea includes a parade for the Concours of Elegance on Saturday morning. The boats will parade in front of the Viareggio pier to be judged by a special commission which will decide the winner who will receive a watch raffled off by Orologi Calamai as a prize. All this will be framed by a Dandy parade in the name of taste, eccentricity and creativity.
velestoricheviareggio.org