Fleet battles to finish Queenscliff-Hastings Race

by Bob Tanner, ORCV on 14 Sep 2005 The seventh and final race of the Bavaria Yachts ORCV Winter Series, the Western Port Marina Queenscliff to Hastings Race, the first offshore race for the 2005-2006 season, started at 6.15am on Saturday in a 15-20 knot north-westerly, giving the 46 boat fleet a good run out Port Phillip Heads and around Cape Schanck.

Unfortunately, the wind eased off from there, making it a frustrating battle up Western Port to the Hastings finish line.

Line Honours for the 43 nautical mile race went to Flirt, Chris Dare’s Corby 49, in 6 hours and 23 minutes, almost two hours outside Cadibarra’s record set four years ago. Second and third across, over 40 minutes behind, were Bullistic (Andy Allsep) and Extasea (Paul Buchholz).

Flirt was not quite far enough ahead to take handicap honours and finished up third in IRC A Division, behind Under Capricorn (Phil Bedlington) and Robert Hick’s 30 ft Toecutter.

In AMS A Division, it was Toecutter first, A Crewed Interest (Eddie Ragauskas) second and Garisenda (Jeff Savage) third. In Performance Handicap A, first was Fiji Express (Andy Williamson), second Garisenda and third A Crewed Interest.

Yachts towards the tail end of the fleet were advantaged by the incoming tide and Western Morning – Justin Brenan’s well-sailed S&S34 - cleaned up the measurement divisions among the smaller boats, with first place in both IRC B and AMS B, plus a third in Performance Handicap B.

Magic (Phil Spry-Bailey) won Performance Handicap B, Silhouette (Brian McDermott) was second in AMS B and PHD B and third in IRC B. By Order of the Secretary (George Shaw) was second in IRC B.

The results of this race were critical to the final scores for the Bavaria Yachts ORCV Winter Series.

Toecutter made the most of it and so won the Lord Warden’s Trophy for best overall performance in the series with five wins from seven races in AMS A Division. Flirt (first in IRC A), Western Morning (first in IRC B) and Silhouette (first in AMS B) had all been within striking distance of the trophy up until the last race, waiting for Toecutter to falter.

Full results for both the Hastings Race and the Bavaria Yachts ORCV Winter Series are available from the ORCV website: www.orcv.org.au