Shining Sea reclaims her Sydney 38 lead

by Di Pearson on 14 Aug 2005 Steve Kulmar’s Shining Sea (NSW) has reclaimed the lead in the Sydney 38 class at Hog’s Breath Race Week today following two windward/leeward races.

After taking an extended lunch break yesterday and subsequently losing her lead of day one, Shining Sea came back with a vengeance today.

Sailing in ideal conditions mostly in the 8-12 knot range, under sunny skies on a fairly flat sea, Kulmar’s crew scored a win and a second place to take the lead back from Hamilton Island Managing Director, Wayne Kirkpatrick and crew representing Hamilton Island Yacht Club, who are now second overall.

Kulmar, with one of Australia’s leading tacticians, Steve McConaghy standing by his shoulder, sailed deep down one run to increase his lead over the rest and held steady to the finish to win by nearly three minutes from Geoff Masters Contentious Issue (NSW).

Gavin Ward from the RPAYC in NSW produced his first win of the series with Eye Candy today, taking out Race 5 by just under a minute from Shining Sea.

The Sydney 38s have a lay day tomorrow with racing continuing on Tuesday with two further windward/leewards starting from 11.00am.

Provisional results after five races:

1 SHINING SEA Stephen Kulmar 10

2 ASYLUM Wayne Kirkpatrick 12

3 CONTENTIOUS ISSUE Geoff Masters 15

4 EYE CANDY Gavin Ward 18

5 EASY TIGER Bruce Palmer 20