I Love Poland has sailed to gold in the 2022 IMA Caribbean Maxi Challenge, the final race in the International Maxi Association's new four legged event. The event saw competitors first compete in January at the RORC Caribbean 600, followed by three of the leading Caribbean regatta, St Maarten Heineken Regatta, Les Voiles de St Barth – Richard Mille and finally Antigua Sailing Week which concluded on Sunday
More than 30 maxi yachts took part including several high profile teams such as George David’s Rambler 88, the Farr 100 Leopard 3, Wendy Schmidt’s new Botin Partners 85 Deep Blue, the former Maxi 72s Vesper and Bella Mente campaigned by Americans Jim Swartz and Hap Fauth respectively. However to qualify for the IMA Caribbean Maxi Challenge you must compete in two races, whereas many of these only took part in one. 
The winning team from I Love Poland are all aged between 17 and 31-years old and sailed in both the RORC Caribbean 600 and St Maarten Heineken Regatta. Around one third of the maxi fleet was made up of the popular Volvo Ocean Race boats, VO65 and VO70.
The event that saw the most maxi boats compete was the RORC Caribbean 600 in which, under IRC corrected time, I Love Poland finished third overall. She then went on to finish third at St Maarten Heineken Regatta behind two VO65s, Sailing Poland and Janssen de Jong-Dutchsail. These combined results lead I Love Poland to take the lead from Leopard3 by two points and at the end of the weekend’s final points tally. 
"Winning the IMA Caribbean Maxi Challenge is significant for our team especially because it is a welcome accolade for the very young Polish sailors we have on board who have aspirations to become offshore sailors.” said I Love Poland’s skipper, former match racer Grzegorz Baranowski.
Andrew McIrvine, Secretary General of the International Maxi Association commented; “We are pleased with the strong turn-out of maxi yachts for the IMA’s first Caribbean Maxi Challenge. We hope our annual championship will both encourage more maxi yachts from around the world to come to the Caribbean to race and help our race organiser partners by boosting the size of their fleets.” 
The maxi racing calendar now moves on to the Mediterranean with the third event of the Mediterranean Maxi Offshore Challenge 2021-22 calendar, the Regata dei Tre Golfi (the offshore part of the IMA Maxi European Championship) that takes place in Naples this Friday evening.