It was a great day for sailing last Saturday when Batemans Bay Sailing Club held its first coastal race of the season.
A fleet of 8 yachts headed out. These included the Adams 10.6 "Wishful Thinking" now skippered by Sydney Hobart veteran Simon Dunlop. Waiting for them were race officer Dave Magill and his trusty sidekick Terry Paton aboard the committee boat "Clarence the Clocker". Dave set a start line for the south east breeze. When this flicked around to the north east during the start sequence there was a race to get down to the now favoured pin end of the line. "Accolade" (Lachlan Brown) and "Moonmist" (Tony Sutton) got the best of the start with "Accolade" just leading from "Moonmist" after the short fetch to the marine park middle mark.
From there the course consisted of a work to the marine park mark off north head, a run down around the southern tip of the Toll Gates and a close reach back to the marine park middle mark. The second lap was another work to the north head mark and a long run back to the finish line off Caseys Beach. The breeze got up to 20 to 25 knots. Most of the boats were carrying number 3 headsails while the "Moonmist" crew sensibly put a reef in the mainsail. "Valhalla" (Dion Perrins and Kathie Blankley) headed in after the first lap.
On the last leg "Accolade" went for the kite hoist during the strongest gust of the day resulting in a round up and a prolonged period with the boat on its side and out of control.
After that unnerving experience the crew pulled the kite down and had a slow and sedate run to the finish. The crew on "Wishful Thinking" saw what happened to "Accolade" so decided not to set a spinnaker and poled out the headsail instead. She caught right up to finish alongside on the same time as "Accolade".
Meanwhile "Moonmist" had no troubles running under her symmetrical spinnaker to finish less than 2 minutes behind. "Moonmist" took a well deserved win on both PHS and AMS from "Accolade" and "Wishful Thinking". "Attitude" (Simon Byrne) and "North Star" finished well back.
In Division 2 "Hobo" (Peter Withington) continued her winning run ahead of "Avior" (Peter Paterson).
Full results are up on the BBSC website www.bbsc.org.au
Above: North Star
Above: Valhalla
Above: Hobo
Above: Avior - All Photos by Terry Paton
