'Like watching jet fighters dance on water': How Luna Rossa lit up the AC38 opener

We may just have seen the start of Luna Rossa’s America’s Cup fairytale in Cagliari.

The opening regatta of the AC38 cycle was about as good a weekend as the Italian Cup project could have asked for. For starters, Margherita Porro and Marco Gradoni’s Women & Youth squad dominated the fleet for the first two days, only falling out of the final at the very last moment, and by a single point. 

Then there was Pete Burling – the man who left the most successful Cup team of the modern era and now finds himself helming for the Italians – leading the Luna Rossa senior crew into battle for the very first time. Burling announced his arrival by topping the regatta leaderboard, then beating his old co-helm Nathan Outteridge in the deciding match race – proof, if any were needed, that Luna Rossa has made the right decision signing the 3x Cup winner.

Off the water, the crowds of Italian fans brought the kind of atmosphere the America's Cup has been missing for years, and that’s only set to ramp up when the circus rolls into Naples in a few months. The Foil's Lewis Smith saw everything unfold in Cagliari, and in this video he unpacks what we learned from the AC38 opener, walking through the racing, the storylines around it, and what it all might mean for the cycle ahead.

Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:48 Day 1
03:34 Day 2
07:25 Final Day
14:52 Outro