The convincing win of Italia Yachts’ 11.98 at the recent ORC World Championship conceals a little secret called “flying jib”, unveiled today in the words of Sandro Montefusco, helmsman, sail designer, and winner of the World title on board “Sugar 3”.

“The idea we shared with Matteo Polli, designer of the Italia 11.98 – explains Sandro – was that of adding a multi-purpose headsail to the inventory, which could be used in the offshore races, since there were two such courses scheduled in the race program. We have therefore decided to sacrifice one of the five headsails allowed on board to build this flying jib: furling, with self-sustaining luff (cableless) thanks to OneSails’ IFS exclusive technology, attached to the bowsprit and hoisted with the masthead spinnaker halyard. We have increased the headsail area by 20m2 compared to the biggest jib, and thanks to the midgirth above 61% the rating penalty was quite moderate. The flying jib proved very efficient in light air and tight sailing angles, to the point where up to 5kts TWS our VMG was better with this sail than with the J1!. This was the sail which won us the offshore race. Built with OneSails’ proprietary Vektor2™ Carbon technology, the flying jib is a sail which gives medium to heavy displacement boats a definite performance advantage in light air, and can also be effectively used for reaching with more wind.”

“Our self-sustaining IFS headsails – adds Dede de Luca, OneSails’ CEO – are proving to be winning sails in many aspects, and are becoming more and more popular thanks to the combined performance and rating advantages they provide, plus the reduction of loads and simplicity of use when compared with more traditional furling headsails. OneSails has proven once more to be at the forefront of R&D, not only when it comes to new technologies, but also when innovation, design and teamwork are what matters.”