Leaders emerge on Day 3 of the J/111 Garmin World Championship
by Louay Habib on 3 Aug 2016
Day 3 - J/111 Garmin World Championship - 3 August, 2016 Louay Habib
With the wind speed in the 20 knot zone, it took Bob Milner's Island Sailing Club Race Committee three attempts, and a Black Flag, to get the fleet away for the first race. Peter Wagner's Skeleton Key unlocked the door to first place with a win in race six.
In the second race the wind speed was well into the red zone. A southwesterly buster put the J/111s back in the 30 knot wipe out arena. The last race of the day was a three hour coastal and despite the strong winds and vicious short chop, less than 3%, separated runner up from tenth.
After seven out of the scheduled nine races, Martin Dent's JElvis rocks the house with a comeback in race seven to take the win and the championship lead from Skeleton Key. Tony Mack's McFly took a second on the last race to finish the day in a solid third for the regatta and there was a podium finish for the Chicago trio of Brummel, Henderson and Mayer racing Kashmir.
Stuart Johnstone and his wife Julia are part of the J/Boat sailing family and racing at the J/111 Garmin World Championship with Australian J/111 owner, Rod Warren, on board Kestrel.
“Myself and Julia met Rod at the J/111 worlds last year in Newport and they asked us to come on board for this year's event, who knew a little bit about the Solent. This is by far the windiest event that the team has raced in, especially with the current pushing upwind, which has a dramatic effect on the pressure on the rig and puts a premium on boat handling. Like everybody else we have had our issues and we have tried to keep the boat under the rig. I think in one spinnaker set we had a record number of broaches in under two minutes but we have a lot of fun. For the most part, we have managed to be in the hunt for most of the races, which has been nice. We have good speed and the real irony is that we have good speed downwind. You sail a J/111 like a J/70 downwind, the set up should be the same; trim and crew placement and that has definitely worked for us.”
To have seven different countries competing is wonderful and what is really interesting is that over the course of time, we have seen the class develop. A lot of these teams have been sailing offshore, Paul van Driel's Dutch team racing Sweeny have been very impressive and they are such a nice bunch of guys as well. The Island Sailing Club is so welcoming, as are so many of the yacht clubs in Cowes, they are fabulous hosts taking care of all of the sailors. The Race Committee have bee doing a fantastic job and the sailing here is easily one of the most challenging places to sail in the world and we have been seriously blessed with strong shifty wind and strong tides.”
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