TFE LIVE: Tuesday's VIP guest will be Gerardo Seeliger (ESP) live via Skype from Madrid, with sp

SAN FRANCISCO (#1163) – Gerardo Seeliger (ESP) is a legendary Finn Class sailor, two-time Olympian, former President of both the Finn and 49er Classes, former chairman of the International Classes Committee and former member of the Council of World Sailing (then IYRU/ISAF). He was Chairman of Spain's first America's Cup challenger in 1992, chairman of the AC92 Challenger of Record Committee, a member of the first-ever umpiring team for a major match racing event (Long Beach YC's Congressional Cup 1988) – the list goes on and on.

One of the most knowledgeable and experienced leaders and diplomats in our sport, Gerardo has been a close personal friend of your Ed. for four decades, and, more importantly, is a good friend of World Sailing President Kim Andersen (DEN).

As our Dear Readers will know, President Andersen finds himself and his organization under increasing pressure over any number of key issues that have been well documented on these pages and on our TFE LIVE shows for over a year, to say nothing of largely negative coverage in other sailing publications across the globe.

Last week Gerardo reached out to his friend Kim Andersen with an extraordinary letter outlining all the issues facing WS as he sees them.

Gerardo's letter was copied to the World Sailing Council and almost immediately leaked to the media. Sailing Illustrated chose not to publish it at the time to allow Mr Andersen opportunity to reply, which he has now done.

We will discuss both letters with Mr Seeliger on tomorrow's show, and, more importantly, what Gerardo thinks his friend President Andersen can and should do to right the World Sailing ship. The discussion will be candid and frank, and we believe Gerardo has a potential significant revelation or two. I think, too, that our viewers will come away from tomorrow's show with a better understanding of the issues facing World Sailing, and renewed respect for President Andersen.

As always, our Coordinating Producer Julia Wedekind will be monitoring the livestream for your questions (post them as comments on the live Facebook feed), or submit them to us in advance via email – sailingillustrated@gmail.com.

Join us for TFE LIVE on Tuesday, 2019-01-08, as usual on our Sailing Illustrated Facebook page, or watch a replay there afterwards.