Close to 1,500 boats had entered Barcolana58 by Tuesday 6 October, according to the organisers. At the top of the fleet are the Mega Yachts, above 24 metres, and the maxis, which race on their own on 8 and 9 October for the Trofeo Portopiccolo before Sunday’s start in the Gulf of Trieste. On Saturday the classic yachts parade in the Bacino San Giusto. From Thursday, the Amerigo Vespucci, the Italian Navy’s 101-metre tall ship, lies at the Molo dei Bersaglieri at the end of her 2026 campaign in North America. And on Sunday 11 October the race itself finishes in front of Piazza Unità, where the first boat across the line wins, whatever its size.
Mega Yacht, Super Maxi and Maxi: the top of the fleet
The fleet is divided by length overall, and the big boats sail in the top three classes: Maxi from 16.01 to 19 metres, Super Maxi up to 24 and Mega Yacht beyond. The Barcolana Maxi – Trofeo Portopiccolo, organised by Yacht Club Portopiccolo with the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano, gives monohulls over 16 metres two days of their own. On Thursday 8 October a coastal race brings them from Sistiana to Trieste, and on Friday 9 October they race on the Barcolana course, with ORC certificates and their own ranking. The organisers sum it up in one line: the event “unisce il glamour di una destinazione unica a un programma di regate di alto valore sportivo”, the glamour of a unique destination joined to racing of high sporting value. On Sunday, line honours go to the first boat home. The last three have gone to Arca SGR, which took 1 hour, 43 minutes and 42 seconds in 2025. The organisers’ history notes that in 2018, in a Bora, Spirit of Portopiccolo brought the time down to 57 minutes.
Classics in the Bacino San Giusto on 10 October
Saturday belongs to the classics. Six days after Les Voiles de Saint-Tropez closed on 4 October, Trieste has its own day for classic yachts. The Barcolana Classic – Trofeo Siad, on Saturday 10 October, opens with a parade in the Bacino San Giusto and continues with a race on a coastal course or a triangle in the gulf, depending on the weather. It takes vintage yachts launched before the end of 1949, classics launched by the end of 1975 and IOR boats from 1970 to 1984. Among them, the organisers mention ocean-going yachts, small Lussin schooners and hulls drawn by Carlo Sciarrelli. The race is organised by the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano with Yacht Club Adriaco and Yacht Club Monfalcone, and the Trofeo Siad goes to the first boat in real time in each of its six categories.
“Barcolana was born from sailing, but it continues to grow thanks to the involvement of an ever-wider community.” Mitja Gialuz, president of the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano, at the flag-raising that opened the 58th edition, 2 October 2026.
The Vespucci at the Molo dei Bersaglieri
Trieste knows the ship well. The Amerigo Vespucci was built at the Royal Shipyard of Castellammare di Stabia and launched on 22 February 1931. She is 101 metres long overall and carries 2,635 square metres of sail on three masts, the tallest of them 56 metres, with a bowsprit of 18 metres. From 8 to 12 October she lies at the Molo dei Bersaglieri, at the end of a campaign that left Genoa in May and called at Tenerife, Baltimore, New York, Boston, Québec City and Montréal, then at Ponta Delgada, Cádiz, Cagliari, Castellammare di Stabia, Naples and Venice. Trieste is the last port. In 2022, the organisers recall, she went out to give the start of the race, symbolically, and on 1 March 2025, at the end of her 2023-2025 world tour, 1,333 sailing, motor and rowing boats escorted her into the Bacino San Giusto. Her motto is “Non chi comincia ma quel che persevera”: not the one who begins, but the one who perseveres.
From 51 boats in 1969 to a Guinness record
The race began small. The first edition, in 1969, had 51 boats at the start and was won by Betelgeuse, and the rule the organisers trace back to that year still holds: whoever finishes first in real time wins. At the 50th edition, on 14 October 2018, the race had 2,689 participants, and Guinness World Records lists it as the largest sailing race in the world. Last year’s Barcolana57 had 1,865 entries. The course has not changed since then, according to the organisers: a quadrilateral of fixed marks in the gulf, 13 nautical miles long, with the start line between Barcola and Miramare Castle and the finish in front of Piazza Unità. The formal name of the race is still the Coppa d’Autunno, the autumn cup of the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano, the Trieste club founded in 1968 that organises it.
The Luxury.it perspective
The Barcolana is known for its numbers. In race week, its luxury is the setting. A tall ship of 1931 at the Molo dei Bersaglieri, the maxis sailing in from Portopiccolo, classic yachts parading in front of the city and, on Sunday, a gulf covered in sail between Miramare Castle and a finish line in front of Piazza Unità. For a visitor, Saturday 10 October is the day to choose, with the classics on the water and the Vespucci in port. On Sunday the start is best seen from the water, or from the coast below Miramare.
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