Audi IRC Series starts at Skandia Geelong Week today

by Di Pearson, Skandia media on 23 Jan 2009
Eighty three entries including the top racing yachts from Australia will face the starter’s gun in the first two races of the Audi IRC Series which is also the opening event of the Audi IRC Australian Championship, at Skandia Geelong Week, starting today from 1300 hours.

Competitors will contest two windward/leeward races on one of the toughest waterways in Australia, Port Phillip off Williamstown.

The overall winner of Division 1 of the Audi IRC Series will win the Audi Perpetual Trophy, but it is difficult to gauge just who will come out on top, with so many well-sailed yachts, although two brand new Reichel/Pugh designs, Loki and Limit, are expected to be prominent.

In the shortened Skandia Docklands Invitational which concluded yesterday when racing was cancelled due to gale force conditions in Victoria and only two races put to bed the day before, Stephen Ainsworth’s brand new Reichel/Pugh 63 Loki (NSW) came out on top with Michael Hiatt’s new Farr 55 Living Doll (Vic) second and Limit, Alan Brierty’s new Reichel/Pugh 62 Limit (WA) third.

Loki and Limit have had some good ‘slug it out’ matches since the pair’s launch in December and will bear watching, while Living Doll’s first major outing here at the Skandia Docklands Invitational showed promise.

However, such is the calibre of the field, the competition is wide open. Yachts such as Peter Harburg’s Reichel/Pugh 66 Black Jack (Qld), Alan Whiteley’s TP52 Cougar II (Vic), Graeme Wood’s Judel Vrolijk 52 Wot Now (NSW) and Bruce Taylor’s near new Caprice 40, Chutzpah, are boats to watch.

Victoria, NSW, South Australia, Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia are represented in Division 1, from which the winner of the Audi Perpetual Trophy will come.

In Division 2, inaugural Audi IRC Australian Championship winner, Rod Jones, heads the line-up with his Archambault 40 Alegria. Strong opposition is expected to come from Ian Short’s Melges 32 Ian Short Sails (NSW) and Ruth Magic, a Beneteau 45 owned by Peter Hill (NSW) with Beijing Olympic gold medallist Nathan Wilmot aboard.

Larriken 2, a Hick 30 owned by Darren Pickering and Stefan Treurniet (Vic) is expected to be strong in Division 3, along with Leslie Norton’s Mrs Overnewton, a Bavaria Match 38 (Vic) and last year’s fourth placegetter, Dr Unc, John Lindholm’s Masrm 920.

The next race in the Audi IRC Series is the Passage Race from Williamstown to Geelong on Saturday, then racing starts on the beautiful flat waters of Corio Bay in Geelong with two windward/leeward races on Sunday and the final windward/leeward race on Monday.

One winning yacht from these three divisions will be announced as the round one winner of the Audi IRC Australian Championship.

Follow the action at: www.geelongweek.com