The Italian team have high expectations and the defending champions think the event will be won and lost on mistakes rather than performance areas or being fast or slow.
Read the thoughts of some of the teams as they get ready for the 2012 season:
Gabriele Bruni (ITA) tactician for AFX Capital Racing
"We are new to the fleet an very excited for our first day of racing tomorrow. Our expectations are high because we all know we want to do well, however we also know that the level of racing in the class is very high. We are ready to learn from the top teams, there are a lot of very good sailors in the fleet but we will fight hard to win as much as we can.
There are strong winds predicted for this week, but for us the more wind we have the more fun racing is! Of course we are new to the class and the strong winds are going to make it difficult to learn but I think to start our season in difficult conditions is a good thing!"
Cameron Appleton (NZL) tactician for Team Aqua
"Coming into this year after winning the 2011 season is a pretty good feeling and last year was extremely memorable. It would be nice to start the season with a good event, I think we have to rely on our ability and just trust ourselves.
We've done a little bit of training here over the last few days and the breeze has been really dense and fluctuating in strength because were so close to the land. There are strong winds predicted for this week so I think we're in for a tough event. We've got a couple of new faces onboard so our goal is to take it a race at a time and settle into it.
I think this regatta is probably going to be won and lost on mistakes by the teams rather than performance areas or being fast or slow, it's all going to be about the teams getting the boat around the course. So thats what we will be focusing on."
Vladimir Prosikhin (RUS) owner of Team Nika
"It's predicted to be windy all week which is going to crate some difficult conditions but it will also mean vary fast racing which for us, makes the event very enjoyable.
It's hard to say how well we will do this year, in match racing I think we have a good chance as our helm and tactician Tomislav Basic is a very good match racer and I belive this and the team work onboard give us as good a chance as any. As for fleet racing we hope to climb the leaderboard, last year we joined at the second regatta of the season and came 11th so I hope this year doing the full circuit we will be able to improve and finish somewhere in the middle."
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Team thoughts getting ready for the 2012 RC44 season 7th February 2012