Dear Skippers and crews of the Classics 2012 Winter Series
Attached are the results of Race 4 and the Series point’s status.
For a change we had a day with some decent wind that gave all boats the opportunity to sail as they were meant to. Lee gunnel down to their critical heel angle where the skippers hand on helm isn’t needed.
As usual fast and clean starts and staying away from the river outflow paid off. Throughout our fleet of 17 starters there many two boat battles. Kingurra v MercedesIII, Boambillee v Pastime II, Ettrick v MarieLouise III, Renene v Blackadder and a four way battle between Serifa/Martini/Ettrick and Tandanya.
Well done to Ellida with her take out of the corrected time honours. Consistent performances by Charlie Salter and Phil Aitkins are reflected in Ellida’s series points status. Same goes to Martini, all that hard and rushed maintenance by Ross Clark and his team during the 3 week layover between races paid off and also to Cyan. With Craig Browns tactical sailing skill and his crew always working hard, Cyan has put the Classics fleet on notice.
Kingurra took out the line honours after eventually wearing down Mercedes III, whose flying start had her leading the fleet to all but one of the turning marks. A sight to see, those two ocean racers from our fleet, working into a stiff breeze.
Mail out of yesterdays results slightly delayed this morning. Took a quick trip to Ivor Evans to give a report on the sample Classic pennant. All sewn with the right weave so it will fly instead of flapping. Definitely larger than a pocket size handkerchief. A must have for our Cup Regatta.
Sad news. Next race is some time away. July 22. We take this break for the Term 2 school holidays. Then it’s a down hill run. Every two weeks till our last race of the series on Sept 5, then the Summer series on Oct 5. Following on is our Cup Regatta Nov 2 kick off with the Guineas and Cocktail reception.
Dear Skippers and Crews of the classic 2012 winter series,
Attached are the entry and handicaps plus the sailing instructions for Race 4 of the 2012 Winter Series.
Sunday’s race will be conducted for the Association by Royals with David LeRoy, race director.
The weather being forecast for Sunday doesn’t look good. We will be in touch with David LeRoy early Sunday for his decision on conducting the race. I’ll send a note to the skippers if his decision is to postpone the race to another day.
There’s been a big three week maintenance effort put into Martini by Ross Clark and his crew. As we know there always seems to be more backward steps than forwards steps with boat maintenance. Ross took several rather large backward steps. Not a problem for Ross. Martini looks a picture and is all set for Sunday. One item still to be completed, the memo to the handicapper. Maybe I can write one for him. Something about a request for a lower handicap as my workshop and push bikes are no longer on board with me and I’ll now have to cope with this lost in space feeling, that should do the job.
Our 2012 Melbourne Cup Regatta preparation activities are under way.
We’ve had pre-commitments from several skippers already. Serious moves are happening to bring our world class 8 metre fleet into the Regatta. Tim Phillips is bringing Storm Bay up. Helen Lovett is returning to defend Oneone’s 2011 Regatta overall takeout. Mark Bergin’s doing great things to bring about a significant Couta boat fleet presence. So far 12 Kiwi’s from the NZ Classic Yacht Association have committed. We have people coming from other states to sail with us.
The H28 Association has accepted the invitation to sail with us in the Regatta to help the Classics Association celebrate the 70th year of the H28.
By Regatta time the Tumlaren fleet should be strengthened by at least one more vessel.
Our Regatta cocktail reception venue at Royals for Friday Nov 2 has been booked. Pip Todd will be managing the function for us.
The race programme is not finalised. At this time there will be the Guineas race on the Friday plus some PR and press coverage activity for us arranged by Mark Bergin. There will be the usual two races on Sunday with the pursuit on Monday. The debate is about the Saturday race format. One or two. We are leaning towards two around the usual RMYS marks. This gives us some leeway to still have a Saturday race if the morning weather is a problem. Your Regatta committee is looking at ways to bring all the members home clubs into the Regatta programme.
By the time the Regatta comes around our 2012/2013 Summer Series will be running
Roger Dundas has completed the assembly of the articles for the latest issue of our Association’s flagship magazine. He has passed his hard work on to Mark Chew’s Blue Boat sales promotion company for formatting, then it’s off to the printers.
An order for 50 sewn Classic Yacht Association pennants has been submitted to local flag maker Ivor Evans. Same as those previously made for us by Ivor Evans, 22” long 11 “ on the hoist. They will run at about a bit over $50.00. We can easily order more if there’s a run on them. We ordered 4 x 7’6” pennants as well for flying on the Royals and HBYC signal mast when we race and for clubs when conducting races for us.
For those in the know the Vic State Gov’t Dept of Consumer affairs has some new Incorporated Associations legislation to take effect July 1. David McKenzie, our association administrator, has processes in hand to comply with these recent changes. The Consumer Affairs website has all the Incorporated Association legislation changes listed.
July 1 is also the start date for the new Vic Gov’t Dept. of Transport, Marine Safety regulations. What’s happening can be chased up on the DOT Marine Safety web site.
Another round of Association subscription renewal will be issued soon a bit earlier than previously to minimize the administration and membership burden required by the 3 sets of fees, Subs, regatta and summer series. Our race entry fees may have to increase, Royals have given us notice of their cost increases.
That’s all for now.
Hope we have some decent sailing conditions on Sunday
Dear Skippers and Crews of the Classics 2012 Winter Series.
Attached are the results of Race 3 and the current series aggregate points after Race 3.
Below is a summary of the Series Points after Race 3,
ELLIDA
15
ACROSPIRE III
16
BOAMBILLEE
16
ETTRICK
17
KINGURRA
17
DINGO
20
MERCEDES III
35
PASTIME II
37
CYAN
38
WANITA
42
MARIE-LOUISE
44
BUNGOONA
46
SAYONARA
48
TANDANYA
48
RENENE
53
JEAN
54
SERIFA
59
VAHINE
59
GALATEA
64
LOAMA
64
MARTINI
65
JAN
68
BLACKADDER
70
GEMFISH
73
CORIO VERTUE
76
ZEPHYR
82
CLAIRE
87
AMANDA
94
MATILDA
94
SCIMITAR
94
The points status tells the story that light winds have been a factor in series so far.
With the high pressure system preventing any of the forecast winds moving up the Bay, a Classics fleet of 21 starters put in a long but enjoyed day with their boats.
Following the 15 minute start delay, yesterdays very light winds race was a matter of having your personal wind that no other boat was allowed into. With the prospect of light wind conditions persisting for the day, the HBYC Race director shortened the course to finish the race at the RMYS Breakwater start mark.
On the light beat to the top mark, Peter McDonald’s Pastime II cleared out to be a dot on the horizon then an hour later becalmed but drifting took out line honours by 1 minute 4 seconds with George Fisscher and Micheal Rhodes on Boambillee eating them up after a brilliant effort by Boambillee’s crew to keep her sailing with a full kite in ghosting conditions.
Light wind performances by the Mercedes III crew supported Martin Ryan to edge out the hard working Ian Mcfarlane, Guido Brandt and Glen Kile on Kingurra.
With no kite to support a downwind drift, Col Anderson’s with his crew on Acrospire III, the task of finding wind flaws and needing sail a longer course in the downwind drifting conditions, prevented them, by a minute, to take the line ahead of Kingurra.
Wanita again showed her all round performance capability under the helm of Richard Gates to move away from the second part of fleet at the top mark and make up ground on the fleet leaders during the downwind ghost to finish with a corrected time fourth.
The three Tumlarens that finished were led by Jim Hutchinson’s Dingo, then Charlie Salters Ellida assisted by Phil Atkins and the first timer, Kelly Rajak. Doug Jenkin was hit by too many knocks to repeat Ettricks previous race performance. Although a DNF, the light wind performance by Galatea, helmed by George low was a noted feature of the Tums duelling together.
With the shortened course and Pastime II’s finishing within the first finisher time limit, allowed an extra hour for two more starters to make the finish line. The welcome return of Phil Edwards “Gemfish” to our race fleet. Tight sailing by Gemfish was rewarded with a finishing time and the honour of taking out Sayonara by two minutes. Sayonara’s team lead by Dave Allen worked hard to bring her home as the last starter to beat the race completion cut off time.
The starters left with a DNF were in with a chance till 0 knots finally guillotined them. Light wind kite battles by Martini, Tandanya, Marie Louise III, Cyan and Bungoona were taking place right to race kill time. No complaints, as the day on the water with their boats and crew was the pay off.
Persistence would have also paid off for Jan and Loama. An extrapolation of their probable finish times would have put them mid fleet. Unfortunately, we know all races have a time limit and light wind days have to be taken with no complaints. Loama, with her great on the dot start put her in a fleet position where her performance was saying this was to be her day. Sad to relate. Not to be.
After giving Marie Loiuse III a light wind performance fright, Renene with Kent Bacon and his persistent crew, unable to recover from the wind knocks, accepted the inevitable and went for an on water tour of the Royal Brighton marina. Blackadder, with Clive Moulday and his crew, also accepted the inevitable and retired to the Royals dining room.
So ends another race of the winter series. Of interest is the performance of the handicaps. After 2 hours of racing the corrected times were reasonably close for the first 7 on corrected time. The corrected times of the remaining finishers indicated how on water conditions on the day make life difficult for the handicapper. As the Classics fleet covers a performance range that varies with on water conditions on the day, only small, if any, handicap changes will be made for Race 4.
One other on water performance noted by the Race 3 fleet was that of the welcome appearance of the RYCV RIB with Roger Dundas and Mal Botterill as driver. Having Roger and Mal on the water and working with the HBYC race director was the way to assist the HBYC Race Director conduct our Race 3 to the proscribed Yachting Australia safety conditions for Category 7.
Roger’s working out the process to make is photos of the day available for perusal.
Another item of good news is the return of David McNiece’s Akala to the water after a project to install a new Yanmar 3YM30 and folding prop. David reports engine is working perfectly and Akala is all set for a return to the Classic racing fleet. A couple of shots of Akala have been attached.
Shots taken by Scott McDonald during the Race 3 drift are available on
Dear Skippers and crews of the Classics 2012 Winter Series
