Gulari stays on top at Melges 24 Worlds

Ft. Lauderdale, FL (May 13, 2022) – The third day at the 2022 Melges 24 World Championship proved challenging as the wind was reluctant to put in a proper appearance in the morning, making the fleet wait for more than an hour before it increased to 8 knots from South-East to get the first race started.

Bora Gulari’s New England Ropes (USA, 5-5-2 today) leads by ten points from Peter Duncan’s Raza Mixta (USA, 4-2-9). Laura Grondin’s Dark Energy (USA, 2-1-6) lies in third overall tonight tied on points with Duncan.

With enough velocity for the first race at 12:15, the first attempt was abandoned after less than ten minutes by PRO Tom Lihan because of the mistaken starting procedure. Then, the expected wind shift arrived, and the Race Committee after adjusting the course sent them off, but then the general recall horn sounded.

At 12:55, the second attempt was successful, and after rounding two laps, it was Drew Freides’ Pacific Yankee (USA, 1-3-10) crossing the line first ahead of Laura Grondin’s Dark Energy and Brian Porter’s Full Throttle (USA, 3-10-1).

Conditions finally began to pick up more in race two and fortunately held for the third race of the day with the teams enjoying some good surfing in 10-12 knots.

In race two, Laura Grondin’s Dark Energy, being second with a small gap in the first race, took a win from the second race ahead of Peter Duncan’s Raza Mixta with Pacific Yankee in third place.

“We had a really good day today and we were really contributed to the fact that our downwind speed was really strong,“ said Laura Grondin at the dock. “We were really working on the boat hard and we passed boats every downwind every race. It was really excellent!”

Third race brought the bullet to Brian Porter’s team on Full Throttle, followed by the current overall leader Bora Gulari on New England Ropes and Zenda Express of Harry Melges IV (USA, 12-7-3).

Three best Corinthians are respectively on the 13th, 17th, and 20th positions in overall starting with Niccoló Bertola’s Taki 4 (ITA, 19-15-13), followed by Fraser McMillan’s Sunnyvale (CAN, 10-17-27) and Geoff Fargo’s Sentinel (USA, 13-14,18), pushing off from the provisional podium team 3 ½ Men of Steve Suddath.

Tomorrow, two races are scheduled with the first start set for 11:00am, but according to PRO Tom Lihan, going ahead may have some challenges and racing might be postponed for the later.

Twelve races are planned for May 11-15, 2022.

Top 10 of 31 after nine races (1 discard):
1. Bora Gulari (USA) 4-1-2-(15)-7-2 16-5-5-2 28 pts
2. Peter Duncan (USA) (13)-13-3-1-5-1-4-2-9 38 pts
3. Laura Grondin (USA) 6-2-10-7-4-(12)-2-1-6 38 pts
4. Bruce Ayres (USA) 5-3-(12)-2-3-7-8-8-7 43 pts
5. Harry Melges IV (USA) 1-5-5-SCP11-2-11-12-7-3 45 pts
6. Travis Weisleder (USA) 3-8-9-4-(22)-9-7-6-5 51 pts
7. Brian Porter (USA) 10-6-6-8-9-(15)-3-10-1 53 pts
8. Drew Freides (USA) 2-(17)-7-17-15-4-1-3-10 59 pts
9. Peter Karrie (GER) 8-4-14-(21)-12-5-6-9-12 70 pts
10. Andrea Racchelli (ITA) 12-(20)-8-11-11-10-9-4-17 82 pts

Race details – Results – Facebook

Source: Piret Salmistu