John Ripard jr and the crew of David Franks’ Strait Dealer secured a very important win in the fourth and final race to be crowned BMW Sailing Cup regatta Champions for 2006. Sonke Stein on board Kerisma finished the regatta in second place closely followed by Lee Satariano on board Artie.

In Class B, Moondance made a welcome return to the sailing field with a well-deserved 1st place followed by Martin Borg Nicholas on board J-Lance. Joe Gerada finished in third place on board his J-92, Jailbird.

Race 1 consisted in a long distance races South towards the Munxar Cardinal Buoy. Strong currents and a lack of wind made this race somewhat a lottery and those who stayed close to the shore were the eventual winners.

On Saturday, two windward/leeward races were organised and saw good crew work rewarded with both Strait Dealer and Kerisma, both placing first in each race. In class 2, Jailbird convincingly won both these races followed by Moondance in race 2 and again by Moondance with exactly the same corrected time as Jailbird.

The three leading boats, Strait Dealer, Kerisma and Arti had to outperform their opponents going into the final race on Sunday. The strong Mistral conditions were perfect for the long coastal race in store.

The race consisted on a series of long beats and runs between the fish farms situated off St Paul's Bay and the Fairway Buoy outside Grand Harbour.

Again it was Dealer, followed by Kerisma and Primadonna who claimed the top spots in Class A, whilst Jailbird, Moondance and J-lance dominated class B.

The BMW Sailing Cup came to a close on Sunday evening with a lavish prize giving ceremony at Couvre Porte.

“This was the first time that BMW, together with Muscat’s Motors, sponsored a sailing regatta in Malta, and we were extremely happy with the quality and the number of entries” said Lennard Pal, CEO of BMW Malta during the Prize Giving ceremony on Sunday evening on the terraces of the Royal Malta Yacht Club.

The winners were presented with a trip of a lifetime - an all expenses trip to Valencia, Spain, to match-race against other nations, which organised similar BMW sailing cups around Europe. The trip also coincides with the beginning of the Luis Vuitton Cup in Valencia.

The prize includes a visit to the BMW Oracle America’s Cup Team and the BMW Formula 1 simulators.

Commodore Georges Bonello DuPuis thanked the whole team of organisers and sponsors and looked forward to next year's event.