After a week of favourable weather conditions, that allowed to held nine highly competitive races, Genoa greeted the 2022 Melges 24 European Championship with a day of no wind. The no race day, matured after a couple of hours of vain waiting on the eastern racecourse, has crystallized the provisional rankings, crowning Strambapapà (ITA) of Michele Paoletti and Mataran 24 (CRO) of Ante Botica as new continental champions of this competitive one-design class. Apart the winners, it's important to underline that nine different teams were the winners of the nine races of the event.

If for Strambapapà (ITA) it was to win the the overall victory, amply deserved by the Paoletti team who just yesterday had missed the opportunity to close the championship with a race to spare due to a gennaker failure, then for the Croatians on Ante Botica's Mataran 24 (CRO), sailing their first season on Melges 24 boat, it was the victory in the Corinthian division and coincided with an excellent second place overall.

Completing the overall podium of the Melges 24 European Championship was Melgina (ITA) by Paolo Brescia, able to confirm himself also again as the winner of the Melges 24 European Sailing Series 2022 - an international circuit consisting of six events with a total of forty-nine single races - of which the event organized by the Yacht Club Italiano was considered as a final stage. The Brescia team, flying proudly the flad of Yacht Club Italiano, was followed by the Hungarians of Chinook, led by Akos Csolto, and Michael Tarabochia's White Room (GER). Chinook and White Room were also dominating the Corinthian division, where the podium was completed by Sergio Caramel's Arkanoé by Montura (ITA).

Ranking results of the Melges 24 European Sailing Series 2022

Returning to the Melges 24 European Championship rankings, it should be emphasized that to complete the Top Five were the outgoing champions on Altea (ITA) led by Andrea Racchelli, that finished nine points behind Melgina, and the Croatians of Universitas Nova (CRO) with Ivan Kljakovic Gaspic at the helm.

Onboard Universitas Nova was sailing also the youngest sailor of the event - Ivan's daughter Mia Kljakovic Gaspic, only 11 years old. The youngest boy of the event comes also from Croatia - 14 years old Noa Sangulin sailing with his father Luka Sangulin on Panjic.

To find the second positioned team in the Corinthian division of the European Championship is necessary to scroll the ranking to the ninth place, occupied by Taki 4 (ITA) by Marco Zammarchi and steered by Niccolo Bertola, while the third is ranked further back, in twelfth place, and corresponds to the name of AleAli Eurocart (ITA) by Barbara Bomben.

To close the European Championship, the last event of the Melges 24 2022 season, was the award ceremony, which was attended by the Mayor of Genoa Marco Bucci, the Councilor for Sport of the Liguria Region Simona Ferro, the Vice President Matteo Berlingier and several members of the board of the Yacht Club Italiano along with the International Melges 24 Class Association and the Italian Melges 24 Class., and most of the competitors of the event. Piero Andolina, the Vice President Europe of the International Melges 24 Class was thanking for the great organization and wonderful hospitality Yacht Club Italiano with all its staff, and also the great number of volunteers, the Race Committee, Measurers' team, International Jury as well the staff of the International Class Association and Italian class.

The next title event of the International Melges 24 Class Association will be the 2023 Melges 24 World Championship to be held in Middelfart, Denmark on June 24 - July 1, 2023.

Quotes of the day:

"Once again Genoa has proved its worth - says the Yacht Club Italiano's Sporting Director Jean Dufour - 9 races completed in 5 days was a great success for the Race Committee, to which goes our thanks, together with the international jury and all the staff at sea and ashore. But the success of this event is also given by a Class itself that has proven to have a great passion, a high level of competition and great fair play at sea. It was a great pleasure to open the doors of our Club to the sailors who had the opportunity during this amazing week to appreciate and discover the beauty of our territory and the city that hosts us –Genoa," was stated by the Sports Director of Yacht Club Italiano, Jean Dufour.

Leading the event since the first day until the end, Giovanna Micol, the Tactician onboard new Melges 24 European Champion Strambapapa said, that the team is happy about the week since they were feeling very comfortable, relaxed and did their best onboard. Onboard Strambapapa with Giovanna is sailing Giovanna's husband, helmsman Michele Paoletti, and Giulia Pignolo and Davide Bivi as another couple along with a great friend Pietro Perelli Strambapapa is a true family crew.

"We are a real family team with two couples and a fifth one onboard being all great friends, knowing each others since we were very young and sailed on Optimists. The atmosphere onboard is really good since we can tell anything to each other and it's great to sail this way. Next season we try to sail some events and working hard to get also to the Worlds in Middelfart, Denmark!" If asking from Giovanna Micol what can she say about Melges 24 as a boat she said: "It's a great boat, it's a funny boat and it's much easier to play and sail than people are thinking of. But first of all, it's a lot of fun to sail on this boat!"

"It has been great to fight until the end with a crew like Strambapapà for the overall success: they are an experienced crew, full of Olympian sailors, and just the idea to stay close to them for all the event has been great. We are just ending our first year in the Melges 24 and we were not expecting a result like this: we feel ourselves honored to be the new Corinthian European Champions and second overall in this great event. Now we look forward to continuing sailing in the Class, because every time we learn something to improve our performance," was stated by Ante Botica, owner of Mataran 24.

Top 10 (9 races sailed, 1 discard):
ITA 689 STRAMBAPAPA' Michele Paoletti, Giovanna Micol, Pietro Perelli, Giulia Pignolo, Davide Bivi 3-1-3-4-(15)-4-2-4-14 35 pts
CRO 383 MATARAN 24 CORINTHIAN Ante Botica, Ivo Matic, Mario Skrlj, Damir Civadelic, Max Carija (16)-9-5-1-4-2-4-11-6 42 pts
ITA 693 MELGINA Paolo Brescia, Simon Sivitz Kosuta, Jas Farneti, Jan Bassi, Stefano Orlandi 9-3-7-6-(19)-3-3-8-11 50 pts
ITA 722 ALTEA Andrea Racchelli, Gaudenzio Bonini, Michele Gregoratto, Rebecca Anderson, Matteo De Luca 4-2-4-8-12-(15)-79-13 59 pts
CRO 567 UNIVERSITAS NOVA Ivan Kljakovic Gaspic, Marin Golem, Filip Miroic, Mia Kljakovic Gaspic, Sime Markic 2-11-2-13-7-9-1-(18)-16 61 pts
USA 841 WAR CANOE Michael Goldfarb, Jonny Goldsberry, Matteo Ramian, Chris Rast, Andrea Serpi 6-4-6-(23)-13-17-5-7-10 68 pts
GER673 NEFELI Peter Karrie, Alessandro Franci, Niccolo Bianchi, Saverio Cigliano, Alessandro Saettone 8-15-9-7-18-5-(22)-1-8 71 pts
ITA854 STIG Alessandro Rombelli, Giorgio Tortarolo, Matteo Ivaldi, Massimo Gherarducci, Federica Salva 7-12-15-16-(20)-7-6-3-5 71 pts
ITA 778 TAKI 4 CORINTHIAN Niccolò Bertola, Pietro Seghezza, Marco Zammarchi, Giacomo Fossati, Giovanni Bannetta 1-7-(31)-14-5-11-11-2-26 77 pts
ITA793 GILLES Pietro D'Ali, Marcello Caldonazzo Arvedi, Andrea Trani, Matteo Capurro, Federico Colaninno 5-(37UFD)-16-3-17-10-14-16-3 84 pts

Corinthian Top 5 (9 races sailed, 1 discard):
CRO 383 MATARAN 24 CORINTHIAN Ante Botica, Ivo Matic, Mario Skrlj, Damir Civadelic, Max Carija (16)-9-5-1-4-2-4-11-6 42 pts
ITA 778 TAKI 4 CORINTHIAN Niccolò Bertola, Pietro Seghezza, Marco Zammarchi, Giacomo Fossati, Giovanni Bannetta 1-7-(31)-14-5-11-11-2-26 77 pts
ITA139 AleAli EUROCART CORINTHIAN Gianfranco Noe, Barbara Bomben, Dean Bassi, Francesco Crichiutti, Federico Borghi (37BFD)-13-22-9-3-14-13-15-2 91 pts
GER 677 WHITE ROOM CORINTHIAN Luis Tarabochia, Sebastian Bühler, Marvin Frisch, Marco Tarabochia, Michael Tarabochia 14-(25)-1-20-11-18-15-6-15 100 pts
NOR787 BLOW CORINTHIAN Peder Nergaard, Morten Helgesen, Petrus Eide, Eivind Rubinstein 12-6-25-(27)-10-1-18-22-7 101 pts