Canting keels revel in overnight land breeze

by Lisa Ratcliff on 31 Jul 2005 The canting keeled Wild Oats X (Bob Oatley) and Wild Joe (Steven David) found the overnight land breeze to their liking and have put 15 miles on the third placed AAPT (Sean Langman) in the 20th Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Race which began from Sydney Harbour yesterday afternoon.

Geoff Cropley from the race record holder Brindabella, the fourth placed boat in the 74-boat fleet, this morning said crews were pleasantly surprised at the strength of the land breeze, given yesterday morning’s pre-race forecast from the Bureau of Meteorology.

‘When the breeze swung from the nor’ east to the west at around 8.30pm last night, it picked up to 15 knots and held all night. This is when the canting keel boats scooted away from us but in the sea breeze, we had managed to climb to within two miles of them,’ Cropley added as they were approaching Crowdy Head, east of Taree.

AAPT and Brindabella are within a few miles of the Volvo 60 Seriously TEN (Eric Robinson) and Neale Cawse’s Vanguard, a Queensland entry which is sailing for the finish club, Southport Yacht Club.

With the land breeze expected to fade this morning and be replaced by another sea breeze, the same cat and mouse game should be played out today between the lightweight front runners, and the heavier upwind performers.

Eighty miles now separates the lead boats, which are approaching Tacking Point south of Port Macquarie, and the back markers, which are off Port Stephens.