REPLAY of the Melges 24 Webinar with Bora Gulari and Niccolo Bianchi

April 21, 2020 - International Melges 24 Class Association (IM24CA) together with Zerogradinord was hosting an online talk show focused on the Starting Strategies – Starboard Tack, Port Tack, Starting Strategies – via Melges 24 Facebook page on April 20. 

Leading the discussion were well known and very experienced Melges 24 sailors BORA GULARI (USA) and NICCOLO BIANCHI (ITA), who were providing valuable insight to this topic.

Bora, as an experienced helmsman with lots of titles in Melges 24 class and two times Moth World Champion (Read more about Bora) and Niccolo, as experienced sailor and the coach for three-time Melges 24 Corinthian World Champion Taki 4 (Read more about Niccolo), gave educational Tips & Hints and useful strategies to our Corinthian teams (not only, of course) to be well prepared for the season when it starts.

The host of the show was the IM24CA press officer Mauro Melandri with the support of the class manager Piret Salmistu and the IM24CA Vice Chairman Europe Miles Quinton.

The following questions were answered:

• Kyle Navin (USA): Bora – How do you perform a natural backdown into your starting hole?
• Hannah Lee Noll (USA): What’s the best strategy for getting a good ping?
• Keisuke Miyata (JPN): Most of boats are equipped with Prostart to know the distance to the starting line. Do top teams have any standard of time and distance to line depending on wind speed? E.g Medium wind - 2min 60m, 1min 40m, 30s - 20m
• Keisuke Miyata (JPN): Any ideal standard time to start acceleration before start, if they have clear water? e.g) 10 seconds or 5 seconds?
• Jeremy Shapley (USA): For Melges 24’s that race in fleets with J 80’s or composite fleets with multiple other boats where is it best to start on the line and start tactics?  Our fleet is mostly J 80’s and J 24’s. But any input is appreciated.
• Michael Tarabochia (GER): Which are the tasks or jobs for the crew members the last minute before the start?
• Kent Pierce (USA): After pinging, how do you use that data? As a driver, I don’t typically have the bandwidth to do the math on time & distance, manage boats around, trim the main, etc. Does the tactician do the math in his/her head and talk to the driver about timing?
• Federico Garcia: Is there a minimum speed for handling the boat before start?
• George H. Peet (USA):  Please talk about boats that sail the entire start with jib out versus deploying the jib at say 25 seconds. Min speed is 2 to 3.5 knots depending on seastate.
• Michael Tarabochia (GER): Do you avoid strong teams windward to your boat or does not matter 10 sec before the start?
• etc.

This was a 60-minute interactive talk show with Q&A.

Thank you, Mauro Melandri and Zerogradinord, for hosting the webinar!