Raja Muda Selangor International Regatta 2015 – the circus moves on

by Guy Nowell, Sail-World.com on 25 Nov 2015 There was plenty of evidence of 100 Plus and black coffee at the breakfast tables this morning. Either the party was still rolling at 0300 this morning, or someone had locked a couple of cats in a dustbin too close my room.

The Raja Muda rolls on, and after breakfast the first order of the day is to get the baggage back on the baggage barge, and then get the sailors afloat. Whether the slow progress in this department was on account of a shortage of jingos (local ferry boats) or a general sluggishness among the sailors after a run ashore must remain debatable.

Breeze and sunshine to start with; less breeze (5kts) and current (3kts, adverse) by the time the fleet assembled for the 1300h start. Eveline demonstrated that it was, indeed, impossible for her to cross the start line in such conditions, so the media RIB went off to check conditions at an alternate start area. Just around the corner and to west of Pangkor Laut the breeze was 5kts from 175? and the current less than 1kt, but the water was 115m deep which made anchoring an impracticality. The solution was a rolling start (Jerry Rollin’ Start? sorry) with both the Committee and Pin Boats holding station as the sequence went through.

All classes went away clear, under spinnaker, steering 330 for Penang. On the chart it is a straight line to the finish, but that doesn’t allow for the notorious Kra Bank, a huge shifting sandbar that guards the finish line just as a bunker guards the green on a golf course. The conventional wisdom says you either give it a wide berth – especially the bigger boats with the deeper keels – or else navigate along a contour, repeatedly tacking in and then coming back out until you think you have ‘found’ the end.

It was a spinnaker reach in 8-10kts breeze for more than half of the distance, then a transition as the wind clocked passed north and went to northeast, faded, recovered, and last of all faded again. Several boats got entangled in fishing nets. EFG Mandrake had no encounters of any kind, but “we found plenty,” said Sarab Jeet Singh, ruefully. “No, we didn’t see any nets,” said Simon Piff (ReKering Dream, Ker 32). “The big boats in front of us did a good job of minesweeping the course. Thanks, fellas.”

Class 1 results were substantially different from Race 1. Alive claimed Line Honours, again, and that was good enough for a third place on handicap. Take a look at the results (www.rmsir.com) for the full details, but there was a real shake-up in the finishing order that elevated EFG Mandrake to the top of the division with Black Baza just one point behind. In fact, one point separates every boat from first to seventh place. It makes for interesting viewing. Peter Fletcher on EFG Mandrake said, “It was a very simple race. We just went in a straight line (as much as we could) and didn’t fall foul of any fishing nets. It was entirely unremarkable, nothing special, nothing clever or crafty.” Is this the KISS principle applied to sailing?

The two-boat Class 2 repeated Race 1: Antipodes 1, Starlight 2.

Class 3 provided little in the way of surprises, too. After opening with a dive towards the coast after the start to get away from the current (?), Fujin clawed her way around the first point and then picked up her skirts and steamed away to a easy win, making it two in a row.

The centenarian Eveline creaked across the line two hours before the 26-hr cutoff to claim a win in Class 6. By then the back office had calculated that as long as she made the cutoff, she would win. Does this mean that Eveline has an unbeatable handicap? That a 100 year old Bristol Pilot Cutter with a very small sail plan is perfectly optimised to be a rule beater? Have Dato’ Richard Curtis and Trevor Richards been talking to Spiesy?

This evening’s entertainment was a little different: rickshaw racing. Once upon a time it was trishaw racing around the plaza at Tanjung City Marina, but with a change of regatta venue to the plush E&O Straits Quay, and an unwillingness among Penang trishaw drivers to have the vehicles with which they earned their livelihood turned into metallic spaghetti by lusty fast-charging sailors, it had to change. Ever since, racing new purpose-built rickshaws has proved to be less exciting – until tonight, when two capsizes and some spectacular aerial gymnastics restored the balance. Well done Aeolus XC for a magnificent win against the odds.

The Raja Muda series continues tomorrow with windward-leeward racing off Tanjung Bungah and Pelangi Beach for the IRC divisions and “something longer” for the Cruisers. We will report.

Short Results to date (full results at www.rmsir.com):

Class 1
1. EFG Mandrake 4, 1 (5)
2. Windsikher 1, 5 (6)
3. Black Baza 5, 2 (7)
Class 2
1. Antipdes 1, 1 (2)
2. Starlight 2, 2 (4)
Class 3
1. Fujin 1, 1 (2)
2. Rikki Tikki Tavi 2, 2 (4)
3. ReKering Dream 3, 4 (7)
Class 4
1. Farrgo Express 1, 1 (2)
2. Nijinsky 2, 2 (4)
3. Old Pulteney Blue Angel 3, 3 (6)
Class 5
1. Sophia 1, 1 (2)
2. Lady Bubbly 2, 2 (4)
3. VG Offshore 3, 5 (8)
Class 6
1. Marikh 1, 2 (3)
2. Aeolus XC 2, 3 (5)
3. Kay Sira 3, 4 (7)