Welcome to Borneo

by Guy Nowell, Sail World Asia on 4 Sep 2006 It’s almost a new event on the Asian sailing calendar, but not quite. Two previous editions of the event produced rather low entry lists, so this year a cash incentive of US$500 and two nights' hotel accommodation per boat ensured that this morning there were 19 boats on the start line, representing no less than 12 flag nationalities.

The BIYC programme consists of one day’s inshore racing in Labuan, the ‘Garden Island of Borneo’, a 100nm passage race to Miri, and then another day’s cans racing at Miri.

Regatta headquarters in Labuan is the Waterfront Hotel, and operations in Miri are based out of the Piasau Boat Club.

Most of the boats participating in the regatta are cruisers, ‘birds of passage’ who don’t usually do a great deal of racing, and most of them don’t have a rating certificate. What most of them do have is an impressive collection of kayaks, windsurfers, jerry cans, solar panels and wind generators on board. A ‘no spinnaker’ allowance was offered for those short-handed cruising crews who felt they needed one, and Chief Measurer David Richards exercised some fine judgement and a little black magic to come up with the handicap numbers.

One unusual question at the skipper’s briefing involved use of auto pilots – many of the cruising competitors were quite sure they couldn’t manage without. In the declared spirit of this regatta – ‘go sailing and have fun’ - the Race Committee duly consulted, and then pronounced that 'no protests will be entertained concerning use of auto pilots.'

During the second BIYC three yachts ‘cruising’ in company on the way to Miri ran out of breeze completely – so they all anchored overnight, logged the down time, and declared it to the RO at the finish – who then adjusted their elapsed times accordingly.

Formal proceedings opened this morning at 0900 when YB Dato Suhaili Bin Abdul Rahman, Member of Parliament for the Labuan Federal Territory, performed the ‘Flag Off’ ceremony, and the fleet left the moorings in front of The Waterfront, heading out past the many oil rig supply vessels to open water.

Borneo is south of the typhoon belt, and is known as ‘The Land Below the Wind’ : this morning proved to be no exception as Race Officer Jerry Rollin sent both the Cruiser and IRC fleets away on geometric courses.

Breeze was in the 4-5 kts department as Kay Wilson’s S&S 36, Ambil Angin, quickly got the better of the other IRC entrant, Sarawak Sea Horse, and held the lead all the way round the track to finish with both line and handicap honours.

Tui Tai, John and Sandra Stonham’s Tayana 47 from Hong Kong, won the Cruiser start on a port tack, and led away in fine style, only to be caught just before the first mark by Colin Craig’s 50’ Déjà vu (that looks to be a good deal lighter than the Tayana!). 'We had a good race all the way' said Stonham, 'but it really was slow, slow, slow. We got down to 0.9 kts of wind speed on the clock at one point, and we don’t really move very well in that kind of breeze.'

Further back in the fleet a number of boats real trouble getting round the penultimate mark, with current pushing them down and not enough breeze to get back up again (good practice for the Olympics!). But at 1400, sharp, the breeze kicked in to a weighty 11 knots and brought the back markers home with a flourish, giving the fleet leaders plenty to worry about. Brunei sailor David Foulkes (Pemburu Laut) wasn’t surprised at all. 'We were expecting it – we always start our races at 1400 hrs in Brunei, because that’s when the sea breeze arrives, as regular as clockwork.' RO Rollin was pleased to see the breeze too – 'we were beginning to think we might be out there a long time', he said.

On board Crystal Blues, Neil Langford from the Royal Prince Alfred YC enjoyed his very first (ever) race, and was especially pleased to come home in third place. 'We are used to rather a lot more wind, and we don’t usually bother sailing in anything less than 12 knots, so this was a bit of a test of patience, but we really enjoyed ourselves. Now we are looking forward to the passage race tomorrow, preferably with a bit more of a blow to get us to Miri in good style.'




Results
Race 1

IRC (Cruising A)
1 Ambil Angin
2 Sarawak Sea Horse

Cruising B
1 Tui Tai
2 Déjà vu
3 Crystal Blues
4 Bogart
5 Pemburu Laut
6 Wanderlust
7 Largo Star
8 Reflections 4

Cruising C
1 Moca
2 Strong Legs
3 Augusta
4 Columbus
5 Do Be Do

Classic
1 Patience
2 Bandoola
3 Reeflections 2

Race 2
IRC (Cruising A)
1 Sarawak Sea Horse
2 2 Ambil Angin