Issue date
Auckland turned on champagne sailing conditions today for the conclusion of the 2015 Jack Tar Auckland regatta, which saw 68 yachts racing in nine divisions and across four courses on the Waitemata Harbour.
The regatta, jointly organised by the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron and Bucklands Beach Yacht Club, is the city’s biggest keelboat event and has drawn a high quality field, with some of the country’s top sailors involved.
Much attention focused on the big boat division, which was totally dominated today by Harry Dodson and Tony Bosnyak’s TP52 Mayhem.
Mayhem lived up to its name yesterday with a couple of uncharacteristic mistakes costing them dearly on the results sheet. “We trawled a spinnaker in one race and came last and hit the start mark in another race and ended up 3rd in that one,” said Dodson.
That meant Mayhem came into today’s racing trailing Viento II (Connel McLaren) by two points. “We had a good day today,” remarked Dodson, which was reflected with a scoresheet showing a clean run of 1st place finishes on line.
When their results were processed, they translated into a clean sweep of wins for the series on line, general handicap and PHRF. Viento II was second in all classifications.
“We were getting everything right today,” said Dodson. “We had no issues. Everything went like clockwork, which meant we broke free of the fleet while the others were mixing it up. Once you get out in front with these boats, it is easy to sail away.”
Yesterday’s racing was marked by quite rough conditions as powerful tides mixed with opposing shifty NNE winds. Today was smoother sailing all round.
“It was champagne sailing,” commented Dodson. “Warm and nice – couldn’t be better.”
A similarly convincing result was achieved in Division B, with Lawless, sailed by members of the RNZYS Lion Foundation Youth Programme defending their title from last year and posting a series scoresheet with seven 1st place finishes, a 2nd and a 3rd.
Two Divisions in the fleet were also competing for their national titles. In the Farr 1020 class, Craig Anderson and his crew stepped up their performance from yesterday and strung together three 1st place finishes and a 2nd today to clinch the national title, followed by Rainbow IV (Alan Smith) and Shokran (Joe Brownlee).
In the 8.5 multihull fleet, catamarans took 1st and 3rd with Dean Williamson’s trimaran Hurts Like Heaven sandwiched in 2nd place. The national title was won by Dirty Deeds (Clive Wright) with Tigre 3rd (Greer Houston and Bob Fisher).
For further results see the event website, www.aucklandregatta.co.nz.
Day One Report:
THE 2015 Jack Tar Auckland Regatta got off to a boisterous start with powerful tides making for lumpy conditions as 68 yachts in nine divisions competed for the honours in the city’s biggest keelboat event.
Sprinkled across the highly competitive fleet were several notable ‘rock stars’ including Peter Burling, the newly-appointed skipper of Emirates Team New Zealand and a multiple world champion, and America’s Cup winner Brad Butterworth.
Both were sailing in Division A comprising mainly TP52 yachts, which are forming a growing presence in the New Zealand racing scene.
By gentlemen’s agreement within the Division, the yachts are principally owner-driven, but the addition of such stellar competitors underscores the calibre of racing in the regatta, which is jointly run by the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron and Bucklands Beach Yacht Club.
Racing conditions were testing, with powerful tides and opposing NNE winds making for confused seas.
After six races in Division A, the opening day honours belonged to V5 owned by David Nathan, with Connel McLaren’s Viento II only 1pt behind in second and Harry Dodson’s Mayhem 3rd.
In B Division, considerable interest centred on the newly-launched Anarchy, a new design by Brett Bakewell-White for Andrew Reid. The boat was built in record time at Yachting Developments with this regatta set as the deadline for its racing debut.
On its first outing, the boat was far from race-optimised but showed glimpses of its potential. The leaderboard was topped by Lawless, being raced by members of the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron’s Lion Foundation Youth Programme. They posted a convincing run of four firsts and a second, with Mojo (Angie Crafer) second and Icebreaker (Steve Purton) third.
In the Open Multihull Division, an early casualty was the well-known Team Vodafone Sailing which retired after detecting equipment issues. The day belonged to Shane Bellingham’s Charleston, who posted three first place finishes on his scorecard, followed by John Kensington’s foiling catamaran, Foiled.
The Farr 1020 and the 8.5 multihulls are using the Jack Tar Auckland Regatta as their nationals. In the Farr 1020s, Rainbow IV, owned by Alan Smith, is holding top slot, followed by Shokran (Joe Brownlee) and Rawhide (Craig Anderson).
In the 8.5 Class, Dean Williamson’s trimaran Hurts Like Heaven is leading the pack, followed by Ken Ormandy’s Voom and Adrian Percival’s Freedom.
Racing resumes tomorrow.
For further results see the event website, www.aucklandregatta.co.nz.
Event sponsored by Jack Tar, Doyle Sails, PIC Insurance Brokers, Yachting New Zealand, Primero Profiles
