By Lachlan Brown
Last Saturday was a great day for sailing when Batemans Bay Sailing Club held the opening race of the COVID delayed 2021/22 sailing season. Before the racing got underway there was a parade of 10 BBSC yachts along the Clyde River. These ranged from the 6m trailerable trimaran "Hobo" (Peter Withington) to the mighty X45 "Xanthia" (James
Gardiner).
Six of these boats headed out for the race. Conditions were near ideal with a moderate sea breeze throughout the sunny afternoon. Race officer Andrew Bain and his trusty crew of Terry Paton and Steve Masterton set a boat end favoured line. "Accolade" (Lachlan Brown) grabbed the boat end start to lead early and was never headed. She was closely followed by club commodore Simon Dunlop and his crew aboard
"Wishful Thinking". Simon Byrne and his Canberra based crew on "Attitude" were showing signs of rust after a lockdown enforced break from sailing. In the end "Moonmist" (Tony Sutton) was close enough to win the race on PHS. There were no AMS results for this season opener.
Afterwards Peter Smith of South Coast Multivolt hosted a well attended BBQ presentation. Sandra Davey and Marie Ward were called upon to judge the best dressed boat and crew which went to Moonmist's zombie pirates for climate change action.
Moonmist and Xanthia
Accolade
Wishful
photos by Marie Ward.
