16ft Skiffs - Bryden Lawyers wins Annual Round Botany Bay trophy

by Michael Chittenden on 22 Feb 2017 The Botany Bay Championship is the oldest 16ft race in Australia run by the St George Sailing Club.

It's a long distance around the cans race around Botany Bay, NSW.

Brydens Lawyers skipper Lee Knapton sure knows how to time things to perfection.

The 16ft sailing veteran guided Brydens to a 50-second win in last Saturday's Botany Bay Championship, sailing a near perfect race to ward off Manly stablemates Fire Stopping (Henry Makin) and Fluid Building (Clint Bowen)

Knapton barely had time to celebrate his first major win of the season before rushing off to be by the side of his heavily pregnant wife Tina.

She was due to give birth to twins at any moment but babies Ava and Otto did the right thing, hanging on until Tuesday to deliver Knapton the perfect end to a hectic few days.

'My head is spinning a bit…it's been a memorable few days,' Knapton said.

'I was pretty safe going sailing on Saturday but obviously the birth was always in the back of my mind.

'The boys (crew Pete Mackie and Harry Morton) did a good and we were able to pick up the win, so it all turned out well.'
Southern Beaches Rugby (Rod Carter) from Belmont took the early lead on Botany Bay, closely pursued by Brydens and Lee Sails (Sarah Lee).



As the breeze slowly died off due to a huge storm to the north of the airport, Lee Sails and Southern Beaches Rugby were left rueing their decision not to go with big rigs.

Brydens, Fluid and Fire Stopping have been joined at the hip in recent seasons, splitting most of the major silverware between them.

So it was no real surprise when the trio took the lead and slugged it out for most of second half of the journey after correctly choosing to go with big rigs.

Brydens, Fire Stopping and Fluid all chose the right way and made it a race in three, with Knapton crossing the line first in front of the St George Sailing Club

Manly's Gill (Damon Zemanek) won the handicap division from Lakeview Constructions (Ross Massey) and Manly duo Growthbuilt (Ryan Wilmot) and Shebang (Anthony King)

For the Facebook video including videos click here - Bob Killick is commentating and tells some great stories from the 16ft skiffs.