The Yacht Club Costa Smeralda changes course. Giorgio Benussi is the new sporting director after 25 years
THE PERFECT GIFT!
Give or treat yourself to a subscription to the print + digital Journal of Sailing and for only 69 euros a year you get the magazine at home plus read it on your PC, smartphone and tablet. With a sea of advantages.
Changing of the guard in Porto Cervo: the appointment of Giorgio Benussi as General Secretary and Sports Director of the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda from October 1, 2025 is official, picking up the legacy of Edoardo Recchi, who is leaving after 25 years at the sporting helm of the Club. And it promises to be a busy winter: the historic Sardinia Cup, scheduled for May 31 to June 7, 2026, is back on the horizon.
Giorgio Benussi succeeds Recchi after 25 years
The YCCS announced that the transition will take place at the end of the racing season, thanking Recchi for a quarter century of accomplishments and leadership and entrusting Benussi with the course for the next challenges, with the support of President Princess Zahra Aga Khan and Commodore Andrea Recordati.
A manager-sailor who grew up among maxi yachts and high-tech boats, Giorgio Benussi has been able to hold together sports governance, technical vision and storytelling for some of the top projects in contemporary sailing. For years General Manager of the Marina di Loano and Commodore of the Yacht Club, he is co-founder of the 69F circuit, a hotbed for new generations of sailors with its “ready-to-race” format, which has helped to clear speed on high-performance monotypes internationally.
In the Maxi world, his name is linked to Pier Luigi Loro Piana’s My Song. For several years he was team manager of Loro Piana’s boats, including winning the RORC Transatlantic Race in 2018 and taking home the Boat of the Year – UCINA Trophy with the Baltic 130, the subject of the famous and much-discussed fall overboard from the cargo ship carrying it.
Sardinia Cup returns in 2026
The year 2026 marks the grand return of the Sardinia Cup, a historic regatta of the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda, with a team format, two per club in IRC, that enhances club tactics and strategies.
The program, with a mix of inshore and stick trials, promises spectacle and close competition in the waters of Porto Cervo, bringing back to the calendar an identity symbol for the international sailing community. In the new technical and institutional framework, Benussi’s leadership comes at the right time to amplify the Club’s sporting project, network and global visibility.
Share:
Check out the latest issue
Are you already a subscriber?
Ultimi annunci
Our social
Sign up for our Newsletter
We give you a gift
Sailing, its stories, all boats, accessories. Sign up now for our free newsletter and receive the best news selected by the Sailing Newspaper editorial staff each week. Plus we give you one month of GdV digitally on PC, Tablet, Smartphone. Enter your email below, agree to the Privacy Policy and click the “sign me up” button. You will receive a code to activate your month of GdV for free!
You may also be interested in.
Winning a world championship in your own land is a crazy thrill. Right Magdalena?
Winning a sailing rainbow title is a huge satisfaction. Winning it in one’s own land is even more so. Maddalena Spanu, born in 2006, from Cagliari (but living in Oristano), is the first women’s Formula Wing world champion in history.
Monotype gathering more than 70 boats at the Worlds after 30 years
Can you find the perfect, and long-lived, racing boat in just 7.32 meters in length? You sure can, especially if the boat in question is called a Melges 24, and proving it, yet another confirmation, was the class World Championship
The 2025 52 Super Series season comes to a close: here’s how it went in Porto Cervo
The 52 Super Series-Porto Cervo-Range Rover Sailing Week, which was held Sept. 22-27 in Porto Cervo, in the waters in front of the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda and which closed the club’s 2025 sports season, has come to an end.
Les Voiles de St. Tropez 2025: vintage boats, maxi yachts and modern hulls for an exceptional edition
From September 27 to October 5, 2025, the Gulf of St. Tropez will welcome more than 240 yachts, including 70 units over 20 meters. Between traditional, modern and maxis, this 27th edition of Les Voiles de Saint-Tropez promises to be
