The Spanish Cruiser Championship has a rule that levels everything: everyone sails the same boat. It is a Tom 28, a one-design, so whoever wins does it with tactics and crew work, not a faster hull. From today, 16 October, to Sunday the 18th, 18 of them will be on the water in Calpe bay, Alicante, in an event the Real Club Náutico de Calpe hosts for the first time, in its 50th anniversary year. Registration and training took place on Thursday the 15th.
The crews come from 13 regional federations. The Balearics, Galicia, Andalucía, Murcia and the Valencian Community each have two; Melilla, Catalonia, Castilla-La Mancha, Madrid, Asturias, the Canary Islands, the Basque Country and Cantabria one. EFE previewed the entry list on 30 September and MarinaAlta repeated the programme on 15 October.
The Canary Islands are represented by a boat from the Real Club Náutico de Arrecife. The sources disagree on its name, and I flag it without resolving it. EFE on 30 September lists Antigua Craiova, skippered by Luis Miguel Cabrera. La Voz de Lanzarote and Desmarque had announced the Lanzarote Sailing Paradise in late June, owner Yé Cabrera and skipper Alejandro Morales, winner of the Baleària Canarias qualifying final in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria bay. That final, in a 12 to 14 knot northerly, drew ten boats from Gran Canaria, Tenerife and Lanzarote. Check the name with the club before it goes into a caption.
The format dates from 2022: each autonomous community sends its qualifier, all in identical boats. Earlier editions were sailed in Baiona, Galicia. Macaco, then named Solum Aedes Home with Javier Padrón as skipper, won in 2024 and took silver in 2025. For the Arrecife boat, La Voz de Lanzarote says, it is a second national appearance after 2022.
There is little to predict. In identical boats, the start, the read of the wind and how well the crew works together decide it. The crew from Lanzarote, according to its skipper in the June report, has youth and plenty of race miles. Sunday will say whether that is enough.
