Saloon Bar wins Cairns to Port Moresby race

by Rob Kothe on 9 May 2001 Saloon Bar snatches line honours in Air Niugini Cairns to Moresby race.

The big Cairns based catamaran Saloon Bar swept to line honours victory in the 2000 Air Niugini Cairns to Port Moresby just before 8 o’clock tonight.

At 8 o’clock on Tuesday night Saloon Bar was 31 miles behind Laurie Needham’s PNG boat API Midnight.

However Saloon Bar swept up the course, taking 16 miles out of her monohull rival by the 5 am radio sked.

The stronger trade wind and a change in wind angle powered up the Queensland catamaran and she surged past API Midnight in the mid afternoon, sailing hot angles across the course.

Saloon Bar reached a top speed of 22 knots late on Wednesday afternoon with a blast reaching headsail.

Skipper Fitzgerald explained that Saloon Bar sailed her own tactical race. She positioned herself for the fastest possible approach to Port Moresby. Her progress would have been faster had she not broken spinnaker halyards, which meant she was unable to carry a spinnaker in the strengthening afternoon trade winds.

Next boat to finish 40 minutes later was API Midnight. Laurie Needham was pleased to have taken the monohull line honours victory but disappointed not to have held out the big multi-hull for the last few hours to take what would have been a truly amazing double victory.

During this morning the three Farr designed boats the PNG boat Racketeer,, the Townsville boat Harrier and Cairns boat Farr Better, are expected to sail through the Passage to the finish line in Fairfax Harbour .

The Coral Sea Classic series continues right through to Saturday, when the local Port Moresby fleet will sail with the Coral Sea Classic fleet inside Basilisk reef..

At the same time, the local Lagatoi fleet will be racing inshore, providing a wonderful spectacle of boats of all sizes and types in the sheltered waters around Port Moresby.