Justin Chisholm Speaks To Reigning Corinthian World Champions - Storm Capital Sailing Team

A few years ago Norwegian sailors Stian Briseid and Marius Falch Orvin established an all amateur Melges 24 team with the goal of challenging for the Corinthian World Championship. Last year in Porto Cervo, sailing as Terra Eindomsmeglng, they fulfilled that dream when finished twentieth in the Gold fleet and won the Corinthian title by a margin of fourteen points.

Clearly not a team to rest on their laurels, this young crew are back again in 2009 with a new sponsor and appear to be even more fired up for success. We caught up with them to find out more about their team and their strategy for success....

IM24CA:  How long have you and your team been together in the Melges 24 class?

Our team bought their first boat in the winter 2005 and started sailing together in the spring 2006. Our team has a varied background in sailboat racing and between us we have raced Optimists, Europes, 49ers, International 11Metre One Designs and lots of big boats. We were originally attracted to the Melges 24 was because the boat had a modern fast design and a strong active fleet already racing in Norway.

IM24CA:  Introduce us to the crew?

The syndicate owners are Stian Briseid and Marius Falch Orvin who originally established the team and brought Peder Jahre in as helmsman. We have had several iterations of the crew since then, but we now have a settled squad who have sailed together now for two years straight.

Our helmsman Peder Jahre is thirty two and a building engineer by profession. He has a fantastic feel for the boat, is very smart tactically too and most of all he is a natural leader for the group.

Twenty year old Taja Zaikowa looks after the tactical aspect of our racing and is also very focused on our boatspeed and heading relative to the other boats. As a law student he has a great eye for detail and this helps with his role on the boat.

Stian Briseid is thirty two and works as a computer engineer. On the boat he is responsible for jib trim and also gives tactical input. As the boat ‘techie' he also solves all our technical problems both afloat and ashore.

Marius Falch Orvin is a twenty six year old broker and does foredeck on the boat. Whatever the situation we always know the gennaker will come down smoothly with him in charge.

Finally we have twenty two year old Sivert Denneche, a Sports Sciences student who both trims our gennaker and fulfils the vital role of ‘team clown' - every boat needs one for good crew morale!

IM24CA:  Before the 2008 Corinthian World Championship victory what had been your best result in a Melges 24 Championship?

Winning the 2008 Corinthian World title was our goal for that year. In 2007 we had won both the Nordic and Norwegian Championships and finished fifteenth at the Europeans.

Having been one of the top three Corinthian teams at the Volvo Cup Series immediately prior to the Worlds in Sardinia we knew we could put up a strong challenge for the title.

Although we were confident going into the regatta there were so many great teams there that ultimately we were all humbled by the experience of winning.

IM24CA:  How much preparation had you put in prior to the 2008 World Championships?

The three Volvo Cup regattas enabled us to test ourselves in big fleets and against many of the best sailors in the Melges fleet. These events enabled us to build our confidence in large fleets and helped us learn how to handle a variety of boat on boat situations.

We put a lot of time in analysing our performances after each regatta so that we could be better prepared for each event. We talked a lot about how we had sailed at the previous regatta and the mistakes we had made. We believe this helped us tremendously in preventing us from repeating the same old mistakes. The progression was remarkable and we were much more conscious about what we were doing whilst we were racing.

IM24CA:  What were the highs and lows of the 2008 World Championship for you?

Other than the ultimate high of winning the title, one of the best moments undoubtedly was leading the fleet for almost a whole race. Unfortunately we ended up losing first place to the Joe Fly guys by just a few centimetres on the finish line. Our lowest point in the regatta was fluffing a very difficult pin end start in the last race and dropping five places overall.

IM24CA:  What are your plans for 2009? What does your regatta schedule look like?

Unfortunately for us we can't afford to travel to the worlds in Annapolis so the title will be in new hands this year.

However with the European Championship in Hyeres in August we have a fantastic regatta to build up to. We are shooting for a top ten overall result and have been using this year's Italian Volvo Cup Series and the Alfa Romeo Cup Series here in Norway as our lead up schedule.

IM24CA:  Why do you think you have been so successful in the Corinthian fleet and what tips do you have for Corinthian sailors who would like to emulate your success?

As amateurs we put a lot of effort in to our ‘hobby' and we try to do it as professionally as we can do at our level and within the constraints of working or studying full time.

The biggest factor is you and your team believing that you are capable of winning. Spend as much time as possible working on speed and boathandling. Of course the old adage ‘practice makes perfect' is never more true than in Melges 24 racing.

To all the teams that are wondering if it is worth spending the money to compete on the Italian Volvo Cup Series we would say - go for it! The fun you will have, the quality of the racing and the challenge of racing against the best is beyond price. In reality if you make your plans and reservations early competing on this circuit doesn't have to cost your shirt and underpants.

IM24CA:  Is there anything else you would like to comment on?

For us it's crucial to have sponsorship so that we can afford to participate in the Volvo Cup and continue our progression. We are incredibly appreciative of the help and support that we get from all our sponsors.

For this season we are very happy to have a new financial sponsor, Storm Capital and we are sailing under the banner ‘Storm Capital Sailing Team'.

We also have changed sails from Quantum to North Sails this year that has given us more confidence in our speed.

Sail Racing is with us for the third year now and their clothing keeps us dry and equally importantly makes us look like a very good and dangerous team

Arnette provides us with perfect sunglasses for yacht racing and Tacktick are supporting us with their new package for Melges 24.