History

Devoti Sailing started in 1992, owned by Luca Devoti who is an Olympic medallist in Finn class.

“I was born in a small village on Lake Garda called Castelletto di Brenzone. It’s a place where the sport of sailing runs though everyone’s veins. Sailing was a way to survive before the long road we all know now was built around the lake. My first introduction to sailing was thanks to my grandfather and my father, who initially took me near to the lake to watch the fishing boat regattas, and then bought a small keelboat and started racing on the lake. As a small child sailing was my whole life.

I grew up and started my Economics degree at Bocconi University in Milan, and put my sports career on hold. While I was there my father left us after fighting cancer for six years. This was when sailing saved me, and I focused on it as the only way to move on.

I started sailing the Laser for a couple of years, but then felt in love with the Finn’s power and my Olympic dream started. I had just one thing in my mind, the Olympic Games. I taught myself about perseverance and hard work.

As I had started dinghy sailing late in life, my technique was hopeless, but I had the luck to have my house next to the lake where I invited sailors from everywhere and trained with them. I studied and learned the finer details of the measurement book,made my own sails and went racing all over the world.

In November 1992 ISAF retained the Finn as an Olympic class for 1996. My partner at the time, Tim Tavinor, was a boatbuilder so I sold my vanguard Finn and we used that money to finance the construction of the hull mold, with the help of Phil Morrison.

The first regatta sailed by a Devoti Finn was the Ski Yachting in Riva del Garda. I needed seven orders to continue the dream and build the deck mold. I sailed as hard as I could in the strong winds against 56 fierce competitors. I won every race and sold eight Finns, and the story of Devoti Sailing officially started. Since then all world championships but two were won with a Devoti Finn, as well as all European championships. We also provided all the Finns to the 1996 Olympic Games and all the medals from then until the farewell Olympics in Tokyo in 2021 were won with our boats.

We made winning 470, Melges 24, we developed the Musto Skiff, we made the D- one, the D-zero, the Optimist and started building the ILCA very recently. We will supply the men’s fleet at the 2023 Sailing World Championships at The Hague, the first Olympic qualifier for 2024.

Our team has grown stronger with the recent addition of Chris Caldecoat, whose professional approach further strengthens our operations. Karel Samsula and Renata are key in running our daily operations with Alicia, Marcin, Silvek, Adrian, Heniek, and all our workers. I want to thank all of them, as they made my dream come true, with their daily passionate work.

Building boats is our passion; helping the sport is our mission. Our dealers share the same passion, and we thrive for perfection, but that is not an easy goal. If anything goes wrong, we put our face to it and help out.”