Hardy Cup - RSYS crew maintain lead on a fresh day

by Peter Campbell on 5 Feb 2014 Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron's Jordan Reece and his Estate Master team continue to head the leader board in the Hardy Cup Under 25 ISAF Grade three match racing event after a day of fresh to strong weather sailing on Sydney Harbour.

After the completion of Round Robin 1 today, Reece had notched up nine wins from ten flights, his only loss being to New Zealander Chris Steele and his 36 Degrees Below team from the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron.

Today’s racing was curtailed after the completion of the first round robin and one flight of the second as the south-westerly breeze kicked in a close to 30 knots late in the afternoon providing some spectacular downwind kite runs in the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron’s Elliott 8 sports boats.

Steele and West Australian David Gilmour today emerged as Reece’s main opposition to a Hardy Cup win in his fifth attempt.

Steele was able to sail in only one race yesterday after a collision with his opponent in the second flight of the day, but he had a day’s hard work on the water today to make up the lost flights. He came out well with eight straight wins, but the record shows seven wins our of 10 because of a penalty point from day one.

David Gilmore finished Round Robin 1 with eight wins out of 10, with wins today against Steele and his younger brother Sam and his Neptune Racing team, also representing Perth’s Royal Freshwater Bay Yacht Club.

Fourth overall is the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia’s Jay Griffin with six wins in Round Robin 1, including beating David Gilmour.

The fresh to strong breeze proved ideal today for Chris Steele (21) and his crew, David Hazard on main and Jay Prestt on the bow, the trio have been match racing together for two years.

'We had a big day on the water today, lots of wind and tough competition in sailing nine races,' Steele said after the racing back at the RSYS.

'The strong breeze suited us…we were really strong on the downwind legs with David trimming the main and Jay call tactics.'

Steele said his best races of the day had been against top rivals David Gilmour and Jordan Reece, his only loss of the Hardy Cup so far.

'We had trailed Reece for most of the race, but managed get through him on the final downwind leg,' Steele said. 'The match against Gilmour was decided on the calls of umpires.