Recently Lee our Fleet Engineer and Sales Representive for Italia Yachts had the pleasure of joining Dirk and Luka of Yacht Match, with whom we are now working, to visit the factory of Italia Yachts and to experience firsthand the beauty and power of the Italia Yachts range.
''I enjoy sailing the most in something that is comfortable, stylish, elegant, and quick.''
Lee Gallagher, Sales Representative for Italia Yachts
Before departing for Italy Lee researched the Italia Yacht brand and stumbled across Matt Sheehan’s article. Matt is a tough man to please when it comes to the racer-cruiser corner of the market and his article was extremely complimentary which grew Lee's excitement to fly out to Italy.
Dirk, the founder of Yacht- Match arranged a meet-up with the Sales Manager of Italia Yachts in Trani whilst there was a regatta happening and 4 Italia yachts were competing. 1 out-and-out racer in the form of the 9.98 and 3 x 11.98’s. Additionally, the larger 14.98 would be there too. The 14.98, a new design from Italian designer Maurizio Cossutti and the Italia Yachts design team is definitely a beautiful yacht and a little more luxurious too, but we have been reliably informed that with Italia Yachts, anything is possible. These yachts can be totally bespoke. In the range is also a 12.98, a 16.98, and a stunning 20.98 in the range as well as an Italia Yachts 43 Veloce.
Lee describes firsthand the excitement of his visit and his experience in Trani, Italy: ''On arrival, as is always the way, I bumped into a sailor I know who raced with me in the Middlesea race twice. Corrado di Nicola is an Italian himself, so I thought I would pick his brains. Corrado was sailing on a Grand Soleil in the regatta and he said he would find it difficult to beat the Italia yachts. Also a positive comment so now I had high expectations of the yachts. I heard that the 9.98 was currently lying 2nd overall in the Coppa Di Campioni regatta in Trani, Italy where I was and I didn’t ask about the positions on the 11.98’s as the owner of the 9.98 was so enthusiastic about his boat after Corrado introduced me that I ended up having a great chat with him. You can choose twin wheels or a tiller, a stunning carbon tiller too. 1 of many things you can tweak to your spec. The LOA on the 9.98 is 34ft and the hull length is 32.7ft. A lot of boats and only 4500kg. Off they went out Saturday morning and raced.
Whilst they raced, I got to test sail the 14.98 with a very passionate owner and the sales manager. Unfortunately, the wind was dying for the racers but we still managed to sail and quickly too. She sat quite happily at 6kts in between 5.5-6kts of breeze. You could see how that reduced wetted area on a heel helped as with her large sail area of 1432 square feet (or 133 square metres) on a 3 spreader swept back rig. Her SA/D (Sail area/displacement ratio) is 29.29, which is pretty high for a racer-cruiser. Pair all of this together and you have a very quick boat in light airs and a fun and lively boat in freshening winds that will certainly put a smile on anyone’s face.
Construction and Design
This is an exciting boat. Construction of all the Italia Yachts use the vacuum infusion method. Bulkheads and stringers are carbon reinforced. The deck-to-hull is not only glued but also laminated together to provide a strong, structure that will not peel away or detach in heavy seas as I have seen on lower-quality yachts. To my eye it looks fast, it looks very sexy, and it looks comfortable.
The deck is beautifully designed. The drop-down boarding platform extends to only leave a wide margin around the transom. This makes for a really big boarding platform. Alex in the office and all of our dog owners will love it.
All lines are lead aft under the deck to emerge from the cockpit coaming just forward of the wheels. There are two winches port and starboard or you can go for the race pack which has 2 extra winches on the coach roof for halyards, reef lines, etc. This yacht can very easily be sailed solo or short-handed as well as fully crewed as you see in most of the Italia Yachts marketing materials where they have just 2 people onboard. The 9.98 and 11.98 can easily be raced with 6-8 people.
Below decks, there are many other extras that I can see that the designer has really thought about like the nav table. Recently at the RYA conference, ECS and paper charts were high on the agenda. The designers have really thought about the ever-increasing use of ECS and that Admiralty will discontinue paper charts in 2030. So, yacht manufacturers are looking forwards with the ever-changing needs and wants of yacht owners.
Layout
The layout was a conventional 3 cabin layout with twin berths in each, 2 aft, and the owners’ cabin forward. The heads were off to port as I came down the companionway and there is an option to have a 2nd heads in the owner's forward cabin or a wet locker. Just forward of the heads is the nav station and a bench seating area in the saloon walking forward into the forward cabin for that 3rd double cabin. On the starboard side in the saloon area, you have the saloon table and seating around to be able to sit the crew comfortably. Aft of the saloon on the starboard side is the galley area and into that starboard aft double cabin. So, with plenty of space, and lots of storage all lighting is indirect and you get a great spacious, light, and airy feel.
Factory
I also got to see the factory where these beautiful yachts are built. The new general manager of Italia Yachts is Sebastian Nolasco. He has been in the post just under a year and has redirected the factory's production processes to make a much greater yacht. He has installed Quality Control gates at each production stage to make sure that these boats come out of the factory ready to hit the water and do what they were designed to be.
In Conclusion
So, my overall view after seeing these boats is this. After watching these yachts race against Swan 42’s, X yachts, Grand Soleil’s, and many others in this regatta, the Italia yachts took all 3 podium places and then the 4th as well. They are quick, there is no doubt about it. The results speak for themselves, in addition to the regatta results, Italia yachts have been ORC World Champions in 2015, 2016, 2019, and 2022. (with 2020 and 2021 being a global pandemic) so they are proven boats.''
We are looking to bring these yachts to the UK and are seeking an owner to work with.