James Spithill wins 2005 King's day Regatta / Atlantic Coast Championship

James Spithill with his Luna Rossa crew of Jonathan and Charlie McKee, Manuel Motero and 11 year old Mac Agnese are the 2005 Carloan.com Melges 24 King's Day Regatta/Atlantic Coast Champions! The last time that the fleet was visited by Spithill and his very impressive team was Key West Race Week. "It's good to be back in the Melges 24. We have a different charter boat, same owner, yet different boat. We've been doing a little bit of work with Dave Ullman and his guys. It's tough. We wouldn't expect anything less."

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Going into the third and fourth races of a five race series, Brian Porter topped Saturday's leader board with Spithill and Ullman very close behind. Sunday's conditions were going to bring a little variety to the weekend with mainly overcast skies and considerably light air 3-5 knots to only as much as 5-8 though out the day. With a course bearing of 045, it took three general recalls to get the fleet off to a clean start, especially Ullman and Jamie Lea at the helm for Stuart Simpson battling for position. Porter and Gabrio Zandona at the helm for Giovanni Maspero both went to leeward taking advantage of some clean air. Approaching the top mark, the left side just didn't pan out for some of the top teams. In fact, the beginnings of a real fleet shake up was well in the works. Lea managed to make his way successfully to the top mark rounding first, followed by Sean Scarborough. Ullman, Zandona, Porter, Spithill and Brun all struggled to stay alive in the top ten. The vast majority of teams stayed right at the offset, Jeff Ecklund with Harry Melges, III calling tactics set off to the left.

Lea held on to the lead going into the first leeward mark pursued by Evan Jahn, Vince Brun and Flip Wehrheim. Bora Gulari at the helm for Chuck Holzman, Bart Griffith, Sean Scarborough, then Spithill rounded respectively. Ecklund made up quite a few positions as he flew downwind. Porter continued to make up some positions as did Ullman and Joe Fly. At the second windward mark everyone maintained position with the exception of Ullman jumping up a couple of positions.

Leading the remainder of the race, Lea had hold of the top position and refused to relinquish, forcing Jahn to settle for second and Brun in third.

The second race definitely put a new spin on just how unpredictable the outcome of a Melges 24 race can be. With continued light air, it was one of the most intense shake-ups seen in a long while. This fleet is by far, the deepest in talent and skill we have ever seen. Out of fifty-four M24 teams only seven registered to compete as Corinthians. The second race proved that they too are very talented amateur sailors and should not be under estimated. After a couple of general recalls and winds still pumping lightly from the NNE, Martin Kullman and Duncan MacKenzie had great speed off the starting line. Coming into the first weathermark, one of the newest US Melges 24 Class members Rob MacMillan rounded first followed by Kullman. Justin Damore was third, Jim Golden was fourth, MacKenzie was fifth followed by none other than Zandona, Spithill, Marc Hollerbach and Lea. MacMillian dominated the remainder of the race, followed by Kullman, leaving the pros to sort the rest out amongst themselves. "I sailed with Nick Halmos at Nationals this past April. We will be in Key West and Miami and we will be back for Nationals here next year. This regatta has been fantastic!" said MacMillian. "Yesterday was really tough, but it seems that with every race we got ten points better than the last." Martin Kullman who is the overall Corinthian winner commented, "We came here to learn a lot and we really did." Justin Damore held on for third, with Peter Baron landing fourth. Spithill was fifth - ultimately sewing up the championship. This last race was a tough one with Ullman finishing 12th, Zandona in 9th, Brun in 14th and Porter had a disastrous finish in 38th.