2018 Melges 24 European Sailing Series at Lake Maggiore, Italy - Overall
by IM24CA 15 Oct 2018 04:26 BST
12-14 October 2018
The Melges 24 fleet on Lake Maggiore © Piret Salmistu
2018 Melges 24 European Sailing Series comes to its end in Luino Italy with the XV edition of Lino Favini Cup. After six events held in Punta Ala, Portoroz, Torbole, Riva del Garda, Domaso and Luino the overwhelming winner both in overall and Corinthian division is reigning Melges 24 European Champion Taki 4 while the winner of the final event in Luino is Flavio Favini and his fellow sailors from well awarded Blue Moon sailing on Maidollis.
82 teams from 21 nations, including 61 Corinthian teams were participating at six events held throughout the season. The total of 44 single races was sailed and for the scoring 7 discards came into play.
This season six teams were taking part of all six events of the Melges 24 European Sailing Series. Not missing any of the 44 sailed single races, reigning Melges 24 Corinthian European champion, Marco Zammarchi's Taki 4 ITA778 with Niccolo Bertola in helm and Giacomo Fossati calling the tactics, Giovanni Bannetta, Pietro Seghezza, Gianluca Derubeis and Lorenzo Piccioni aboard through the season, is the overall winner of the 2018 Melges 24 European Sailing Series, replicating also their success of the last year in the Corinthian division.
Niccolo Bertola, the helmsman of Taki 4 was happy about the successful season. "Despite of having to adjust with the change of the crew, especially bowman, we managed well and it was a good season. We obviously value very much the title of the Europeans, because it was a tough competition, but a test event in Torbole one month before the Europeans was successful for us and it helped us to manage better at the title event."
As Taki 4 has achieved in this class almost everything in the Corinthian division - two-times Worlds' title, one Europeans' title both overall and Corinthian trophies of the European Sailing Series - what's their next goal? "We are trying to improve next year and looking forward to as good as possible results in overall ranking. Definitely we'll see a great competition next year at the Worlds in Cagliari and because it will be at the end of the season, then we'll see more boats training through the season and all teams have a great chance to be as good as possible to fight for the title there. We also appreciate a lot the change in this years' scoring system giving more chances also to the teams who were missing one event, and also because the podium places were not decided until the final event creating more interest this way."
Second classified in the open division of the Melges 24 European Sailing Series is Maidollis ITA854 of Gianluca Perego, reigning Melges 24 European champion and the overall podium is completed by Michael Tarabochia's White Room GER677, who managed to climb there with the final event in Luino.
However, in Corinthian division the second position of White Room GER677 was strong enough to secure it with Luino event and Miles Quinton's GILL Race Team GBR694 is third Corinthian of the series this year.
2018 Melges 24 European Sailing Series Overall: (top three)
1. TAKI 4 ITA778 - club YCI - 187 pts
Niccolo Bertola, Giacomo Fossati, Giovanni Bannetta, Pietro Seghezza, Gianluca Derubeis, Marco Zammarchi, Lorenzo Piccioni
2. MAIDOLLIS ITA854 - YC Cortina / AVAV - 216 pts
Carlo Fracassoli, Flavio Favini, Enrico Fonda, Gianluca Perego, Stefano Lagi, Giovanni Ferrari, Matteo Ramian, Tiziano Nava, Alfio Lavazza, Giovanni Ferrari, Federico Valenti
3. WHITE ROOM GER677- club DTYC - 289 pts
Luis Tarabochia, Michael Tarabochia, Max Stein, Felix Röder, Marco Tarabochia, Sebastian Bühler, Franziska Vosswinkel
Full overall ranking of the series here
Corinthian 2018 Melges 24 European Sailling Series: (top three)
1. TAKI 4 ITA778 - club YCI - 187 pts
Niccolo Bertola, Giacomo Fossati, Giovanni Bannetta, Pietro Seghezza, Gianluca Derubeis, Marco Zammarchi, Lorenzo Piccioni
2. WHITE ROOM GER677 - club DTYC - 289 pts
Luis Tarabochia, Michael Tarabochia, Max Stein, Felix Röder, Marco Tarabochia, Sebastian Bühler, Franziska Vosswinkel
3. GILL RACE TEAM GBR694 - club RORC - 300 pts
Geoff Carveth, Miles Quinton, Oliver Wells, Matt Alvarez, Holly Scott, Emily Au, Andrew Blundell, Tim Hancock, William Goldsmith
Full Corinthian ranking of the series here
The last day of the XV Lino Favini Cup in Luino was nice and sunny, but unfortunately not windy enough to start any race. There was a hope for the morning breeze, but around 9 am, when the first warning signal was scheduled, the postponement flag instead was hoisted ashore. Between 11 am and noon the fleet headed to the northern part of the lake with a hope that southern breeze would fill in, but did not happen before 2.30 pm when there was a last chance to start the race. So the XV Lino Favino Cup was completed with a series of five races and the results remained as they were after the second race day.
After a while not racing Melges 24, the event's host Flavio Favini, helming Gianluca Perego's Maidollis ITA854 with his fellow sailors from Blue Moon Tiziano Nava, Giovanni Ferrari and Federico Valenti, and in addition also Alfio Lavazza, managed to find their good move after a bit rusty first day and with a score of (7)-6-1-1-1 secured the victory of the event dedicated to Flavio's father as well the title of Melges 24 Swiss champion.
Miles Quinton's Gill Race Team GBR694 with Geoff Carveth in helm scored 1-1-4-4-(9), was second on the podium and the best Corinthian team in this regatta. Marco Cavallini's Jeko Team ITA638 completed the overall podium with the scorline of 2-4-3-(8)-6, being at the same time second in the Corinthian division. Marco Zammarchi's TAKI 4 ITA778 was third in this regatta.
See the full results here.
After the winter the European season will resume in 2019: dates and locations of the entire series will be announced shortly, but the most prestigious event of the year - 2019 Worlds will be held exactly in one year time in Cagliari, Sardinia on October 11-18.
More information about the event and series available at melges24.com/europeansailingseries