Istanbul, Turkey – Two races today sailed in a pleasant 6-9 knot southerly breeze has produced two new ORC Sportboat European Champions: Saruhan Cinay skippering his Turkish team on HSSK’s J/70 NIMBUS in Class A, and Ott Kikkas’s Corsa 915 SUGAR, helmed this week by Branko Brcin, in Class B with a mixed Estonian and Italian crew.

At this year’s event there were 27 entries that raced together while being scored both overall and in two separate classes that define ORC Sportboat Class A and Class B. NIMBUS scored 21.0 points in 6 races to be on top of a very competitive 15-boat Class A, only 1.5 points ahead of Levent Peynirci’s J/70 CHEESE SAILING. Besides skipper Cinay, the NIMBUS team included Canbert Mete, Deniz Topal, Sevan Habes, and Nayra Dursun.

In contrast, SUGAR dominated the 12-boat Class B by over 40 points to their nearest rival, Sinem Ergun’s SB20 HARMONIX, helmed by Guray Zunbul. Besides Kikkas and Brcin, racing on board SUGAR was Matteo Polli, Paolo Bucciarelli, Maraliisa Umb, Karl-Robert Trink, Risto Riim, and Maurizio Loberto.

The strong turnout of local teams along with interest from outside Turkey from new designs like the Corsa 915 indicates continued significant growth potential in the ORC Sportboat class. To be defined as an ORC Sportboat, the boat must be between 6.00 – 9.15 m in length, be no more that 2000 kg in weight, and have a displacement/length ratio of < 6.00.

As seen here in Istanbul, well-sailed popular one-designs may race competitively using the ORC Sportboat rules, and the corrected time results show this: after nearly an hour of sailing many top ten race results here were often decided by only seconds in corrected time.

“This was my first Sportboat championship,” said Corsa designer Polli, “and I’m impressed how well the system seems to work. There are some gaps among the planing and non-planing boats when the wind is strong, but today in more light and moderate conditions it is very even. I think this class has great potential.”

This was one of the best-attended championship events thusfar in this class, with talk already of new host locations next year. As borders and movement between nations re-opens, the easy mobility of Sportboats make them a perfect candidate for the growing demand for cost-efficient and competitive international sailing.

Complete results are available at https://data.orc.org/public/WEV.dll?action=index&eventid=fqity.

Event website: www.orcsportsboateuropeans2021.com.

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