2015 Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race – Dad and daughter ready to race

by Tracey Johnstone on 17 Jul 2015 2015 Land Rover Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race – Sunshine Coast dad and daughter sailors, Andrew and Samantha Scott, return to blue water racing next week for the race.

They will be racing in the 14-member team on Roger Hickman’s 30-year-old, 43-foot Wild Rose, in the first of the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia’s Blue Water Pointscore races.

Samantha’s first offshore race was last year when she joined her father on board Wild Rose for the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race. “During the race Samantha just shone. The first night was a bit of a nightmare as everybody was sick, her included. But after that, she came good. I was really proud of her. Our relationship has deepened from that experience and as a consequence her life has changed incredibly,” Andrew said.

The Wild Rose team famously went on to win the storm ridden race, taking out overall handicap honours.

Samantha has since stepped up to be part of the permanent crew on Wild Rose, moving from Cotton Tree to Sydney to be closer to the boat and her new job in Hickman’s software support company.

“Samantha is an integral part of the team now. She is being groomed to do the bow; she just doesn’t know it yet. At the moment, she is doing mid-bow.”

For Andrew, the last six months have been fairly quiet on the sailing front apart from competing in the NSW IRC Championship at Port Stephens where the Wild Rose placed second in Division 2. But that all changes from next weekend. Hickman has planned an intensive offshore and regatta program for Andrew, Samantha and the rest of the crew, going right through to December and the Hobart race.

“We usually concentrate on the Blue Water Point Score. It’s a series of six races which all start from Sydney. The Sydney Gold Coast is the first one.

“We are also doing the Airlie Beach and Hamilton Island regattas. Hamilton Island doubles up as the IRC Australian Championship which is the one we are really focusing on.

“Then we will do the events leading up to the Hobart race and then after that we have another whole heap of regattas including the national IRC titles in Hobart in January.”

The Gold Coast race fleet of 66 yachts heads off from Sydney Harbour on July 25 on the 384-mile sprint north. Andrew believes the Wild Rose team will have their work cut out for them as the new Beneteau 40s and Sydney 38s race the old boat for handicap and line places. “There are some good sailors among those boats. They are who we mark ourselves up against. If we are up with Ariel (Beneteau 40), we are happy. They are a really good crew and a really good boat.

“The Sydney 38s should just about beat us over the line. I am just not sure as we have a new configuration. For Hobart, we put a bowsprit on and masthead spinnakers and a Code Zero. In big winds, the bigger spinnakers stabilise this boat. Being an old IOR boat, it is very unstable going downwind. They are not pretty to sail downwind.

“For the 30-year-old boat, she is as good as new. She is strong. Wild Rose has been talked about as the best-built boat ever coming out of McConaghy’s. It is really a good, old boat and in absolutely sparkling condition,” Andrew said.

The race start is still too far away to judge the start day conditions. Certainly this race has previously delivered consistent 40-knot southerlies one year and light and variable, rock-hopping offshore winds for another year.

Either way it doesn't matter to Andrew. He will proudly have his daughter by his side as they, Hickman and the other Wild Rose team members drive the old girl hard towards another handicap win.