Audi ORC International World Championship 2012

Class division GPH to 615

merenkavijat — Wed, 09 May 2012 21:07:09 +0000

“The positive problem” of having record big racing fleet in the ORCi Worlds has caused a demanding challenge to ORC and Organizing club Merenkävijät. First decision was to split the fleet to two separate race courses. Then we had to decide how to split about 130 boats to these courses and when doing this guarantee manageable and at the same good quality racing. This all has taken time and we regret this delay in publishing the dividing GPH.

ORC and Merenkävijät have now agreed to decide and publish mainlines of the race format.

1. In the Class A the competing boats have GPH under 615. This class sails “traditionally” in one group throughout the racing week. The size of this Class is about 40 boats.

2. In the Class B of about 80+ competing boats the boats have GPH of 615 or higher. This group is divided to two Heats equally sized selecting alternate boats from the entry list in order of GPH. These Heats sail qualifying races from Monday to Wednesday (or at least 1 offshore race and issued minimum of inshore races). After this Qualifying Round the boats for Heats in the Final Round are determined by their results. Boats with the lowest scores will sail in Class B Gold Fleet and boats with highest scores in Class B Silver Fleet.

Press release with precise wording of this format is going to be published on the ORC site www.orc.org immediately.

Enfant Terrible joins the fleet

merenkavijat — Thu, 03 May 2012 22:30:19 +0000

Current World Champion Alberto Rossi with his Farr 40 Enfant Terrible comes to Helsinki to defend last year´s winner title in Class A. The fleet is now 127 boats and still slowly growing. Crews onboard consist now just under 1000 offshore sailors from 16 countries.

Audi Sailing Team changes boat

merenkavijat — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 22:31:30 +0000

Finnish Audi Offshore Sailing Team has now decided to take their Grand Soleil 42R from the Mediterranian to ORCi Worlds in Helsinki. This ORCi topscorer both in Finland and also in many international regattas is skippered by Jani Lehti.
Team´s former boat Salona 38R is going to be sailed in the Worlds by a Croatian team skippered by Karlo Kuret. Kuret is one of the top sailors in Croatia where the team sails Salona 42R “All 4 One”. This team has been many times Croatian champion and was third in ORCi Worlds 2010.

City of Helsinki supports ORCi Worlds

merenkavijat — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 09:52:59 +0000

City of Helsinki Sports Department is assisting significantly SC Merenkävijät to organize the Audi ORCi Worlds 2012. Predicted number of participating boats has almost doubled. GREAT! This has anyhow ment that also the need for boat places at Särkkä Island has doubled. Sport Department is helping in this and delivers extra floating piers to Särkkä. Floatig piers are also delivered to Hernesaari (look at the map on the info page) where boats can be equipped and supported throughout the race week.

http://www.hel.fi/hki/liv/en/Boating gives information of Sport Department and it´s services to the sailors. On the page you can also find a guide to the Helsinki Archipelago.

Bohemia Express joins the fleet

merenkavijat — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 23:01:43 +0000

Last year´s silver medalist in class A joins the fleet which is now record high 123 boats from 15 countries. Bohemia Express is a Grand Soleil 42R and has been one of the top boats in european ORC racing during last years. Boat is skippered by Richard Vojta from Czech Republic.

On the info page you can find information of accommodation, local weather in August, transport, launching etc. It is good to notice that hotells are going to be crowded in August because of some big conferences and concerts. For example Madonna performs in Helsinki at 12th August.

BOW 2012 – NOR and registration

merenkavijat — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 17:14:47 +0000

Baltic Offshore Week 1.-4.8.2012 Notice of Race is published and registration is open. BOW is a joint Finnish and Estonian ORCi Championship and it is scheduled to be a perfect warm up for ORCi Worlds. Organizing club is NJK which has the home harbour nearby Särkkä. Windward/leeward races will be sailed on the same race courses as in ORCi Worlds.

Event page for BOW is www.bow.fi.

The Grand Old Lady, Leif Ramm-Schmidt’s Swan 37 “Tarantella II” was once again the first one to enter the race.

At least 120 boats will sail in two classes

merenkavijat — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 23:29:09 +0000

Boat number 118 to join the fleet was Italian GP42 “Airis” which was 7th in the Class A last year in Cres. There are still potential entries to further increase the numbers.

Final decision of the GPH dividing the fleet shall be made in 1st of May according the NOR. Intention is to have two classes about the same size with max 10 % difference. Based on the now entered fleet the cutting GPH seems to settle between 620-625.

Helsinki weather

ottoaalto — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 08:37:20 +0000

The lecture on the 8^th of February organized by the Finnish Offshore Sailors Association was all about the weather and specially in Helsinki. The event was very popular with over a 100 interested racers gathering for the occasion. The expert weather guy was Mr. Jukka Nieminen, a keen racer and a participant in the upcoming event with his Salona 37.

Helsinki weather in August is generally mild and pleasant with prevailing light to medium SE winds, at least statistically. In fact, there is no set weather pattern in the Gulf of Finland, which makes for an interesting race week and highlights the importance of getting a good feel for the weather conditions and following forecasts. The Gulf’s lack of tides also removes one challenge from sailing but is more than offset by the challenging shallow and rocky waters so typical to the Finnish archipelago.

Early August is usually the warmest time of year in Helsinki. There will also be plenty of daylight hours, albeit no midnight sun. On the average, during the race week the days are over 16 hours long giving racers plenty of time to complete the offshore races before darkness.

For more detailed information check the Offshore_worlds-2012_conditions.pdf and Daylight hours in Helsinki 3-11.8.pdf on the info-page.

First time limit passed with 115 entries

merenkavijat — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 01:11:43 +0000

First time limit for the entries is now passed and the last day before 1st March woke up 15 more boats to join the fleet which is now 115 boats. During this day also the first X-41 boats sent their entries and now we have already 3 boats wanting to warm up before the X-41 Worlds which follows Audi ORCi Worlds on the same racing area in Helsinki. There are still many potential boats to enter which means that in August we will have unforeseen rush on the race courses with about 900 sailors.

Boat number 95 is another TP 52

merenkavijat — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 23:48:14 +0000

Another TP 52 in the fleet is “Blixt Pro Sailing” which is skippered by Patrick Lindqvist from Finland. Patrick has been for years a Congress member and Special Reglations Committee chairman in ORC. Thomas Blixt from Sweden will be at the helm in the boat.

Boat number 94 comes from Italy. “Scugnizza” is a Cossutti designed NM 38 as is Sugar II from Estonia, which was now entered to the race instead of the old T 34 “Suga#r. Scugnizza was placed 4th in class B last year in Cres.

We have now boats from 11 nations in the fleet, which is still going up in numbers. Just now it is really difficult to estimate the final numbers because there are still many known boats in Finland and abroad which will join the race. SUPERB!