Sydney 38 One Design Nationals - Preview

by Simon Reffold on 24 Jan 2008 In eight years of National Championships in the Sydney 38 One Design Class - two boats have their names on the trophy twice; Pittwater's Cameron Miles' Rush and Lou Abrahams' Challenge from Sandringham.

Now, for the first time in three years, these friendly rivals will be head to head on the water again, this time in the waters of Corio Bay in Geelong in the Morris Finance sponsored Sydney 38OD National Championships, being sailed as part of Skandia Geelong Week.

Cameron is returning to the Class with Stephen Ainsworth and many other of the Loki crew whose boat sank from under them late last year off the coast of Sicily. Make no mistake; this is a well oiled machine that has many miles and championships under their belt. But its not like Lou Abrahams is lacking in experience, 44 Hobart's, countless Class and Rating Championships and an excellent crew makes for a tough competitor and, as they say, 'age and experience will always beat youth and skill'.

However, this is far from just a two boat race. Just ask Pittwater based Chris Way whose Easy Tiger team have certainly been the ascending star in the Class over the past twelve months. They came second at the Docklands Invitational last weekend, the lead up event for these Nationals, and were at great pains to explain that this was only 'because we were trying different sail combinations and had some equipment problems'. They certainly were fast and Tactician Peter Winter has made a big difference this season, helping Tiger to a succession of top three places including the NSW State Title. They would certainly like to think they were in with more than a shot this weekend.

On that basis too, Alan Brierty's Limit is well fancied. Alan has had his head down and bum up for the past 10 years or so building a successful Plant Hire business servicing the Mining Boom in WA. However he is now returned to his beloved sport of Sailing and has recruited old chum Roger Hickman to run his programme which includes his Sydney 38 and offshore yachts - with a new boat on the way. Limit was the winning boat last weekend at Docklands and that was without their tactician for the Nationals, Melbourne legend Ian 'Barney' Walker who is an impact player of some magnitude.

All these boats though, have some professional crew and at the core of the Sydney 38OD Class is the Corinthian Spirit - and that division will be equally hotly contested. Corinthian boats have no professional sailors at all aboard and this is the way many of the Victorian boats like to sail. Leading from the front is John Chatham's 38 South. John hails from Sandringham and, whilst relatively new to the Class, he and his crew have been making quite an impact on the Local fleets racing. John was a respectable sixth in last weekends warm up and is capable of at least top five in the Nationals.

So too is fellow Corinthian competitor Sierra Chainsaw, skippered by Mel Mollison from Sandringham. They won the Corinthian division last week and showed some exciting form, if a little inconsistent. Doubtless though they will have been working on this and are expected to feature in this weekends racing.

Looking at the form though - it's hard not to keep coming back to Cinquante as a dark horse. Skippered by Ian Murray from Geelong, these are his home waters and his young and energetic crew already proved they are more than capable with a divisional win at Audi Hamilton Island Race Week last year.

All that matters though, is what goes on on the water and all this will be resolved tomorrow, when racing starts.

www.sydney38classassociation.com