Six months to go and fifty one teams from fourteen nations are already signed up to compete against Irish world champion Conor Clarke and his Embarr crew. The Royal Irish Yacht Club crew will race at the 2017 Melges 24 World Championship that takes place from 28th July to 4th August in Helsinki, Finland. The Notice of Race has been published, online entry has been open for a while and Melges 24 sailors across the globe are invited to make their entries for this prestigious event organised by the Helsingfors Segelklubb (HSK) in co-operation with the International Melges 24 Class Association (IM24CA) and Finnish Melges 24 Class Association.
Back in Helsinki after 14 years
It's been a while when the International Melges 24 fleet was racing in this part of the world. The first time for the international Melges 24 fleet of fifty six teams to race this north was in 2003 when Jacob's Creek Melges 24 Europeans were organised by the same hosting club HSK. Sailors might also remember the most recent title championship in this area organised by the Finnish-Estonian Melges 24 Class Association in Tallinn, Estonia in 2010.
IM24CA is happy to work again together with a bunch of people familiar from the past events' organisations to ensure the success of the title event. Perttu Rönkkö, 2017 Melges 24 Worlds Regatta Chair and Vice Commodore for HSK will be excited to host such international fleet of Melges 24s, especially for the Worlds this time: 'HSK is happy to host Melges 24 International fleet for the World title event. At the same venue the Melges 24 Europeans were held fourteen years ago, but the both club and surrounding area has been developing a lot during the last years. To serve our club members and foreign sailors better a new club house was inaugurated in 2010 which makes organizing such a great event even more comfortable here.
