ORCi Worlds

No racing on Sunday due to blustery conditions; Bohemia Express and Sagola win Corinthian Trophies in Classes A and B.

Through consistently excellent performance through this week of inshore and offshore competition, George Andreadis’s (GRE) GS 42R Meliti IV has been crowned the 2009 ORC International World Champion in Class A. Giuseppe Giuffre (ITA) and his team on his M37 Low Noise has also won the World title for Class B.
The event, hosted by Circulo della Vela (CVB), scored a total of 5 inshore and 2 offshore races in conditions varying from light to blustery. In fact, conditions were brisk enough today to prompt CVB race managers to first delay the start of racing, then ultimately abandon the effort altogether as the strong 25+-knot northerly had not showed signs of abating at all today.

“We feel really happy to have achieved this victory,” said Andreadis. “The whole team worked really hard and the results have paid off.” Over the past three decades of active competition in several competitive classes Andreadis has been a perennial champion, but this is his first ORC International World title, even as that title was within his grasp at last year’s Worlds in his home waters near Athens yet slipped away on the final day of racing. But this was not the case here in Brindisi, where his win was highly convincing: Meliti took an early lead in the week’s racing and held and extended that lead daily despite stiff competition in a crowded 36-boat class.

And in an even more crowded 41-boat Class B, Giuffre’s Low Noise briefly lost the lead after the offshore race results, but regained and even extended it back after inshore racing resumed yesterday. In fact, Low Noise dominated this class inshore, winning all but one of their five races.
Teams entered in Class A and Class B who had no more than one ISAF Group 1 crew member on board and only Group 1 helmsmen were eligible to be scored for the Corinthian Trophy in each class. In Class A Vodri Doprava Evropska’s (CZE) 5th-placed GS42R0 Bohemia Express was the top-scoring Corinthian entry, while in Class B it was Fausto Pierbon’s (ITA) runner-up GS37B Sagola on top of the 34 entries (83% of the class) eligible for this trophy. In Class A there were 21 (58%) Corinthian entries.

“Suitable World Champions have been crowned here in Brindisi,” said ORC Chairman Bruno Finzi. “The wide variety of conditions, the large number of races, and great depth of Corinthian and non-Corinthian talent in a large field of entries all created a challenging contest. We extend to them our heartiest congratulations, and a profound thanks to the organizers from CVB and all their sponsors for a fantastic event.”

Farr40 Worlds

Porto Cervo put on one of the feasts for which it is famous in the sailing world: A cobalt blue sky, solid warm breeze, decent waves and three excellent races. All on day one of the Rolex Farr 40 World Championship 2009. Barking Mad (USA) sits atop the heap this evening, with a narrow three-point lead over the 2008 Worlds sparring partners Mascalzone Latino (ITA) and Joe Fly (ITA). Today was all about keeping clean and trying to stay mean. Some got it right, others did not. The three race winners were Barking Mad, Nerone (ITA) and Transfusion (AUS). All three sit in the top five and will be happy to have held it together on a day when only four boats posted results inside the top ten in each race. Current World Champion, Vincenzo Onorato on Mascalzone, sits in second place after quietly going about his business to score a 2, 10, 2. All three races were held in a breeze that varied between 16 and 22 knots over the day, but stayed pretty consistently from the west. All three races were won from the front and clearly getting of the line cleanly, in good position was key. The second key to a successful day was minimising the points spread. According to Vasco Vascotto, tactician on Nerone the left hand side of the course looked the best, certainly for the first two races where their tactic of winning the pin worked well. In the third race, Nerone went hard left again and was more than a little disappointed to find itself the wrong side of a shift, which bumped the crew hard down the rankings to mid-fleet.