Little boats lead Gold Coast race on handicap

by Lisa Ratcliff on 1 Aug 2005 It will be a busy night for Southport Yacht Club with twenty-three yachts from a fleet of 74 now finished the 20th Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race and forty or so due before 7.00am tomorrow morning.

The remaining yachts still at sea are enjoying a quicker than expected ride to the finish line ahead of a 12-15 knot sou’easter which is blowing them home in good time, and blowing the smaller yachts into contention for the coveted handicap trophies.

Andrew Cochrane’s Stewart 34 Pendragon has led the IRC fleet since this morning and is still at the top of the leader board ahead of a newcomer to the top three, Anthony Paterson’s Mumm 30 Tow Truck which has made massive gains since yesterday when they were sitting in 22nd place on handicap.

‘All the boys are happy with our performance so far but we are just getting on with it,’ said Cochrane a short time ago as they were sailing north of Evans Head with 70 nautical miles to go to the finish.

‘The sou’easter has filled in here and further up the coast and we don’t expect it to ‘glass out’ but you never know,’ he added, referring to last year’s race when a light patch close to the finish left them stranded and cost them an overall win by just over half an hour.

Andrew Short’s Farr 40 Club Marine (ASM) has featured strongly in the top three all day and is provisionally sitting in third position on IRC handicap.

In the PHS division, placings haven’t changed since this morning with Gunnar Tuisk’s Cadenza still leading Dreamtime and Azzurro.

Following a line honours win by Bob Oatley’s Wild Oats X, at 9.56am this morning and a second over the line for Steven David’s Wild Joe, the battle for third place between Queensland boat Vanguard (Neale Cawse), George Snow’s Brindabella and Sean Langman’s AAPT was nothing short of titanic with all three finishing within seven minutes of each other and AAPT pipping Vanguard by just two minutes after two days at sea.

In the end, it was the private battle between Brindabella and Vanguard that began last night which cost both of them a chance at third place. While these two boats tried to pass each other further off Main Beach on the Queensland Gold Coast, Sean Langman managed to sneak up the beach and enjoy a clear run to the finish.

‘About 150 metres from the finish we tried to sail around Brindabella and ended up too high to make the finish line ahead of AAPT,’ said Cawse.

‘We worked so hard and we thought we had it but we are not unhappy with fourth. All five pre-race line honours favourites finished in the top five places which is a great result’.