Italy and the America's Cup: from Azzurra to Luna Rossa in Naples

The breakthrough came in San Diego in 1992. Il Moro di Venezia, the challenge of the Compagnia della Vela di Venezia, financed by Raul Gardini and skippered by Paul Cayard, won the Louis Vuitton Cup 5–3 against New Zealand, in a final remembered for the bowsprit protest that cost the Kiwis a win.

That put an Italian boat in the Match for the first time. The Defender, Bill Koch's America³ with Buddy Melges at the helm, won it 4–1 in May 1992. One race is not much, but it set the pattern that has held ever since: an Italian boat reaches the Match and meets a stronger Defender.

Luna Rossa was founded in 1997 under Patrizio Bertelli, still its president, and its first campaign was the 2000 Cup in Auckland, for the Yacht Club Punta Ala, with a Neapolitan in charge: Francesco de Angelis, born in the city in 1960, was skipper and helmsman. The team beat AmericaOne 5–4 in the Louis Vuitton Cup final, then met Team New Zealand in the first Match ever sailed without an American boat. Russell Coutts' crew won it 5–0.

Then the long middle: a semi-final exit in 2003, Louis Vuitton Cup finals lost to New Zealand in 2007 and 2013. The best Match came in Auckland in 2021, with James Spithill and Francesco Bruni sharing the helm and Max Sirena, now the team's CEO, as skipper: Luna Rossa won the Prada Cup 7–1 over INEOS Team UK and lost the Match 7–3 — three race wins, more than any Italian boat before or since.

Barcelona 2024 brought a fifth Louis Vuitton Cup final, lost 7–4 to INEOS Britannia on 4 October, bracketed by the two trophies Luna Rossa finally took home: the Youth America's Cup on 26 September, with Marco Gradoni and Gigi Ugolini steering, and, on 12 October, the first Women's America's Cup, which Giulia Conti's crew won by 8 seconds. Gradoni now shares the senior boat's wheel: he co-helmed with Burling at the Naples preliminary in September 2026.

All those campaigns were sailed on someone else's water: Newport, Fremantle, San Diego, Auckland, Valencia, San Francisco, Barcelona. The Louis Vuitton 38th America's Cup is the first ever in Italy, and racing runs 22 May–19 July 2027, planned from 14:00, directly off the Lungomare Caracciolo between Castel dell'Ovo and Posillipo. For the first time, in summer 2027, the Italian challenger sails in front of a crowd that can walk to the course.

The club has changed too. In July 2025 Luna Rossa, on its seventh campaign, announced it would challenge through the Circolo del Remo e della Vela Italia, founded in 1889, whose clubhouse stands on the Banchina Santa Lucia in front of Castel dell'Ovo — the castle pictured above, at the eastern end of the course. The other news of 2025 was Peter Burling: helmsman of New Zealand's last three Cup wins, he joined Luna Rossa on 20 June 2025.

The results since are encouraging and, frankly, meaningless. In the two 2026 preliminaries, sailed in the smaller AC40s, Luna Rossa beat Emirates Team New Zealand in both finals: by 33 seconds in Cagliari, by 17 off the Lungomare in September. None of it counts for 2027, when the AC75s race for real, and the Defender has won the last three Cups. Luna Rossa calls itself the longest-standing challenger in the Cup's history, a title that also records that it has never won it.

Do not plan to watch the Cup from inside a Naples sailing club: they are private, and nothing has been published about public access during the 2027 racing. But the two that matter most share one public quay, the Banchina Santa Lucia in front of Castel dell'Ovo. One is the Circolo del Remo e della Vela Italia, Luna Rossa's club, by its own account the oldest in the city; the other is the Reale Yacht Club Canottieri Savoia, founded in 1893 by eleven members who left the Italia, now Host Venue Yacht Club Partner and Neapolitan home of Emirates Team New Zealand. Challenger and Defender on the same quay.

The Savoia was also Mascalzone Latino's club, Vincenzo Onorato's Neapolitan challenge of 2003 and 2007. Further east, at the Molosiglio gardens, is the Circolo Canottieri Napoli, founded in 1914, since 24 September 2026 the official host club of GB1, the British Challenger of Record. At the far end of the course, the Circolo Nautico Posillipo, founded in July 1925, hosted Tudor Team Alinghi for the September 2026 preliminary; its 2027 arrangements have not been announced.

The Borgo Marinari, the little harbour at the foot of the castle, is where the two worlds meet: public tables at water level and, above them, the terraces reserved in 2026 for the invitation-only hospitality club (the 2025 plans envisage one again for 2027). Castle visits during the Cup are still to be confirmed by the Comune; the viewing spots are in our where-to-watch guide. To be part of it, stay between Santa Lucia and Chiaia and walk, as we at Vesuview would — and as the members of those two clubs have since 1889 and 1893.