Ideal sponsor for chilly winter race on the Derwent

by Peter Campbell on 22 Aug 2010 Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania’s Winter Pennant Series ended today with just one and two points separating the top two yachts overall in all three divisions.

Sailed on the River Derwent in a chilly north to north-westerly breeze of 14-18 knots, sometimes gusting to 22 knots as it swept down from a snow-capped Mount Wellington, the fifth and final race had a much appreciated sponsor, Inner Circle Rum.

Crews toasted the winning skippers of Pisces, Leander and Riverdance as they warmed up at the clubhouse after a morning of closely fought racing over the windward/leeward course.

Pisces, the Sydney 36 skippered by Graham McKibben, sailed a perfect final race to hold out a determined bid by Michael Denny’s Wild West right to the finish line. The win gave Pisces the Winter Series by two points from Wild West with third overall going to Bruce Palmer’s Moonshine, another two points behind.

Each of the three top boats had wins during the series with Pisces notching up a scorecard of (5)-1-2-2-1 for six points compared with Wild West’s 3-2-1-(4)-1-2 for eight points.

In Division two, the final race saw a win for Gavin Hall’s Serenity from Footloose (Stewart Geeves) and Leander (Stephen Henley) with the third place sufficient to give Leander, a Dragon class yacht, and the overall series by just one point. Leander’s series placings were 1-(8)-1-6-3 for 11 points.

Footloose and Trouble (Dave Willans) finished equal on 12 points after discarding their worst races, with a count-back giving second place overall to Footloose. Footloose’s placing’s were 5-(9)-4-1-2 while Trouble’s scorecard read 2-3-(5)-3-4.

Just one point decided the winner of Division three with Wayne McNeice’s Riverdance finishing second today to Elliott 5 (K Hill), third going to Ragtime (Tom Kirkland).

Riverdence, with a series score of 2-(3)-1-2-2 for seven points, took the winter pennant by the narrowest of margins from Elliott 1 (James Anderson) which had headed the series until the final race, ending with a scorecard of 3-1-3-1-(4) for eight points.

Third overall went to Ragtime on 12 points (1-2-(8)-4-5) while today’s race winner, Elliott 5 placing fourth overall on 13 points.

For more information, please go to: www.ryct.org.au