2007 is history. Another record year for the Midwest. Eighty-two boats competed in at least one Midwest event. Thirty-two races were sailed over six events. Thirteen boats competed in at least four events.

A interesting thing happened in Lake Geneva this year. Five races with thirty-one boats and every race had a different winner, a different 2nd place boat and 3rd place boat. The event winner Brian Porter and Paul Hulsey in third posted two 4th place finishes.

Winning the Midwest series is Chuck Holzman and Co. on Flyer. Flyer the 2005 and 2006 Midwest champion scores a "three peat" and earns all bragging rights until May of 2008 when we start over. Congratulations! They sailed in every event and outlasted everyone else. Second place went to John Podmajersky, Paul Hulsey and his HooDlum team were third.

Go to www.melges24racing.com for full results.

The Grind
The picture you see here is Full Throttle and Flyer battling it out for last place during race 1 of this weekend's Melges 24 US Nationals. Despite a horrific start for both boats, you're looking at the new US champion and Corinthian division US champ. Pretty damned impressive.

Porter's crew included Melges Performance Sailboats President Harry Melges III and VP Andy Burdick, also from Lake Geneva, Wis. We felt like we had a speed edge all weekend. Melges said. Porter was very impressed with the difficulty of the racing conditions. There was just no predictability at all to the wind shifts, the new Champion said. The lake would just fake you out in between regular shifts, and the only solution was speed.

Local owner Chuck Holzman's Flyer's final day surge lands them the Corinthian Championship at the 2007 Audi Melges 24 US National Championship. (credit: Tim Wilkes/Tim Wilkes Photography)

Detroit-based Flyer won the Corinthian division with a phenomenal final-day surge. Flyer, sailed by Chuck Holzman, Bora Gulari, Pat Drummond and Mike Firestone, finally showed the speed thats earned them the reputation as one of the areas top Melges 24 teams. Flyers entire crew collected prizes along with the other top 4 Corinthians and the 5 overall top

Dispite light wind, heavy chop and a threatening line of thunderstorms, we managed to get another five races off today to make a grand total of TWELVE races over two days! Chuck, Bora, Patrick and Mike off of Flyer ended up pulling out the win by the narrowest of margins over Mr. Hulsey and Hoodlum Crew after both teams basically traded off 1st and 2nd place in most of the races. Both teams did a great job this weekend! Full Results are here.

Again - Another huge thanks goes out to Loretta and the rest of the race committee for helping us to pull off another great local regatta! We really appreciate the help!!

The next major event on the Midwest fleet schedule is on Mike Dows home turf (Traverse City). Fleet #32 will be represented heavily! See you there!! Here's the NOR.

Photo by Mer.

There aren't too many places that can pull fourteen Melges 24's for an informal race like this one - but they sure did come, and many brought the big guns. Carrie Howe, the USA's best shot at Olympic Gold next year, is shown here, trimming the kite for fleet newcomer Andrew Morrison on GBR 618. They finished fourth, in good company - A point behind was Adam Hollerbach's FU with ABN AMRO 2 veteran George Peet calling tactics. Chuck Holzman's Flyer, with Anarchist Bgulari calling the shots, took the 5-race regatta, with Anarchist Napoleon Dynamite's Hoodlum Racing in third. With that many Anarchists in one class, you can imagine the post-race party.

Don't forget that this year's Melges 24 U.S. Nationals will take place right here at Bayview on September 21-23, with over 50 teams expected from the U.S., Canada, and Europe. I'm helping my brothers get the word out, and I promise - it'll blow your mind. Register now, and maybe we'll get this thing to 60 boats. Photo by Mer.

At the half way point Flyer, the 2005 and 2006 Midwest Champion, leads the 2007 Midwest Championship Series on points.  Flying Toaster, sailed by The Dow, from Traverse City is in second, one point behind.  Pied Piper, sailed by Jack Jennings from Chicago is in third.  The next event is in Traverse City at the end of August.  Stay tuned.

For full results go to http://melges24racing.com/DOCS/2007_thru_detroit_2007.pdf

03 JUNE 2007 • The second day of the Detroit NOOD was dominated by Midwest boats — eight of the top ten finishers call the Midwest home! John Podmajersky onboard 'USA-511' from Chicago, Ill. won the 2007 Melges 24 Sperry Top-sider Detroit NOOD by a mild eight points over Friday's leader Mike Dow on 'Flying Toaster' from Traverse City, Mich. Only one point beyond, in third place overall is Jack Jennings on 'Pied Piper' also from Chicago who won the tie breaker for 3rd place from Chuck Holzman on 'Flyer' from Farmington Hills, Mich.

On Saturday, the Melges 24 fleet managed two races despite the continued light conditions. In race two Podmajersky got a jump on the fleet with an almost instant win. Thomas Ritter on 'Tramp' from Bloomfield Hills, Mich. followed Podmajersky across the finish line in second and in third was Chuck Holzman, Bora Gulari, Pat Drummond and Mike Firestone on 'Flyer'.

The third race of the series offered a complete turnover in the standings with Marty Jensen from Charlevoix, Mich. having a spectacular race on 'ZigZag' taking the bullet, Jennings was second and in third was none other than East Grand Rapids' own Ken Gray on 'USA-175.'

Sunday was set to be the showdown between Podmajersky, Dow, Jennings and Holzman, but early on with the forecast predicting severe thunderstorms racing was cancelled leaving Saturday's results as the finals.

	Sail #	B oat Name	Helm	Race 1	Race 2	Race3		Total
1.	USA 511	USA 511	John Podmajersky	2	1	7		10.0
2.	USA 613	Flying Toaster	Mike Dow (C)	1	4	13		18.0
3.	USA 659	Pied Piper	Jack Jennings	10	7	2		19.0
4.	USA 660	Flyer	Chuck Holzman (C)	4	3	12		19.0
5.	USA 615	Hoodlum	Paul Hulsey (C)	7	14	4		25.0
6.	GBR 592	Team Gill	Simon Strauss	9	11	5		25.0
7.	USA 142	Tramp Stamp	Scott Miller	3	15	10		28.0
8.	USA 708	Tramp	Thomas C. Ritter	17	2	11		30.0
9.	USA 378	Tiburon	Bill Carleton (C)	13	9	8		30.0
10.	USA 700	Fu	Marc Hollerbach (C)	19	8	6		33.0
11.	USA 175	USA 175	Ken Gray	18	13	3		34.0
12.	USA 687	Firewater	George Hayne (C)	22	10	9		41.0
13.	USA 99	Building Speed	Kevin Lewand	16	16	16		48.0
14.	USA 677	Sweaty Betty	Alex Shafer	6	28	15		49.0
15.	GBR 618	GBR 618	Andy Robinson	26	6	17		49.0
16.	USA 510	Rustler	Fred Rozelle (C)	12	19	18		49.0
17.	USA 202	RumBlur	Rob Bunn (C)	14	20	19		53.0
18.	USA 416	Bretwalda	Bob Pethick	29	5	20		54.0
19.	USA 625	Zigzag	Marty Jensen	30	24	1		55.0
20.	USA 4	USA 4	Uri Saks	11	22	24		57.0
21.	USA 176	Diminished Fifth	James Beebe (C)	8	21	31		60.0
22.	USA 414	Evolution	Lance Smotherman (C)	5	29	27		61.0
23.	GBR 593	Trader 2	Fred Detwiler	15	23	23		61.0
24.	USA 533	The Drive	August Hernandez (C)	24	17	21		62.0
25.	USA 291	Hot Seat	Tom Wyman (C)	21	12	30		63.0
26.	USA 610	Speedemon	Rick Mallinson (C)	20	31	14		65.0
27.	USA 114	Temerity	Charles Hess (C)	23	25	22		70.0
28.	USA 570	Cujo	Greg McCliment (C)	31	18	28		77.0
29.	CAN 346	Vapour Trail	Marc Steyn (C)	28	27	25		80.0
30.	USA 30	USA 30	Maggie Shea (C)	32	26	26		84.0
31.	USA 12	Underdog	Peter Wenzler (C)	27	30	29		86.0
32.	USA 153	Catawampus	Patrick Leonard	25	32	32		89.0
33.	USA 113	Rapid Sequence	Timothy O'Neill	34/DNF	34/DNS	34/DNS		102.0