Australian charter group provides Racing berths

by Justin Moore on 15 Jun 2006 Charter sailing holidays, in great locations are popular everywhere. Sailors from around the world are racing in some of Australia’s best know offshore races and regattas and sailing on Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef is a mid-winter magnet.

A Sydney based company, Sailing Services, is now providing racing berth opportunities for sailors from around the world to join the fun and to escape, as Australian sailors do, from the southern winter to the tropical north.

Sailing north with an experienced racing skipper and a 13 person paying crew will be Sailing Services’ Kioni, a well-performed Beneteau 47.7. Kioni has already completed two trips to Hobart with multi-nations contingents. She sailed south in 2004 as Fineline and again in 2005 with a mixed UK, US and Australian crew.

Come wintertime and Kioni races north. On Saturday July 29th, Kioni will be part of the fleet racing 914 nautical miles from a wintery Sydney Harbour up the NSW coast to Mooloolaba and then north along Fraser Island, the Breaksea Spit and up in the Whitsundays. She will arrive in Mackay in time for Airlie Beach Race Week and Hahn Premium Race Week at Hamilton Island.

Sailing Services Operations Manager Nick Athineos explains; ‘we take offshore racing seriously. For those races we prefer crewmembers to have recently completed a Safety at Sea and Survival Course. We operate on a safety first basis, sailing conservatively and until now we have expected mid-fleet results.'

Kioni has often done better than that. She won her division at Hamilton Island Race Week in 2003. She finished fourth on PHS in the 2004 Gosford-Lord Howe Island and raced at Airlie Beach and Hamilton Island in 2005.

‘This year in 2006, we are emphasising safety and training as always, but we are expecting gains on the performance side. We have started Kioni on a fairly strenuous optimisation program, under the guidance of the highly experienced Michael Spies. Michael is a Hobart winner on a Beneteau 40.7, and has been campaigning a fully optimised Beneteau 44.7 very successfully.

‘Our Kioni Teams racing in the Mackay, Airlie Beach and Hamilton Island races will be experiencing the benefits of the optimisation. Of course there is the downside in that they will have less excuse for poorer performance. Then the whole optimisation program will be complete by the Hobart qualifier, which is the Gosford to Lord Howe Island.

'Before races or regattas, we run training days that allow for crew familiarisation and assessment. Of course we all yarn and tell each other stories that we then need to live up to. The day before an offshore race we all get together and the skipper coordinates all the details, in terms of ensuring everyone’s equipment is right and that all the food and all the sailing equipment is all on board.’

The next opportunity to join a Kioni crew is the Sydney to Mackay race and the expected race time is six or seven days. Since this is a Category 2 race it will be necessary for at least a proportion of the crew to have offshore experience, as well as certified training (Safety at Sea and Survival, Marine Radio, First Aid).

The tropical north then beckons, with Airlie Beach Race Week (10-17 August) on Kioni’s agenda. This event is now in its 17th year and promises five race days of racing, with a lay day in the middle of the race week (perfect for socialising). Since this is a Category 7 Race Series there are fewer restrictions on crew qualifications than in other offshore races.

Hamilton Island Race Week (18-26 August) closely follows Airlie Beach.

For all these events, prospective crewmembers need to contact Sailing Services as soon as possible, as berths are going fast.

Kioni familiarisation and training days will be held in June and July 2006.

Full package details are available on the website www.sailingservices.com.au

Sailing Services Pty Ltd

Email: info@sailingservices.com.au

Mobile: +61 (0) 438 082 616

Fax: +61 (2) 9405 5891

Address: P.O. Box 5407
West Chatswood
NSW 1515