Sharp tactics planned for Pale Ale Rager

by Mike O'Reilly on 13 Feb 2007 Top offshore yacht ‘Pale Ale Rager’ will be racing in the Adelaide to Port Lincoln Classic this month with a hand-picked crew of small boat sailors, all selected from the Lightweight Sharpie Association.

The decision to go with Sharpie sailors is a natural outcome from offshore yacht racer Gary Shanks and his son David putting 56 footer ‘Pale Ale Rager’ into semi retirement last season - to go sailing with the traditionally wild Sharpie skiff class.

Their plan was to 'get their bums back closer to the green stuff', after sailing 8 Sydney to Hobart races – including surviving to finish in the top five in PHS in the horror 1998 Hobart race. Daughter Catherine, also a veteran Rager offshore racer, went back to skiff sailing, competing for Australia and SA in the World and National 420 class over the past two years.

Last year the Shanks boys dragged out David’s old Sharpie ‘Freak on a Leash’ (in which he won the National Junior title in 2000) to again race in the SA season and the National Titles held at Largs Bay between Christmas and New Year.

'There’s no better way to sharpen your reflexes than with a Lightweight Sharpie,' says Gary Shanks, fresh from hanging off the trapeze wire for son David, with legend Matt Young on mainsheet for the Nationals at Largs Bay.

Surrounded by several hundred Sharpie sailors at Largs Bay, things went haywire over a few ales after the nationals, when ‘someone’ hatched a plan to muster a Sharpie shock-crew to assault the Adelaide to Port Lincoln Lexus Bluewater Classic on February 23, 2007.

All they needed was a big boat. Fact is, Gary (Gazza) Shanks has always had a few Sharpie sailors on Rager’s many Hobart and Port Lincoln race campaigns. They took line honours in the 2002 and 2003 Adelaide - Lincoln races, narrowly missing the race record in 2002.

This might be the first major offshore race in which a boat crew is being drawn from a single class of racing yacht – and an inshore skiff class at that.

Providing the big boat is re-born Sharpie sailor Gazza – with one of SA’s fastest offshore boats, the 56 foot Elliott keelboat that has an important big event sponsor, Coopers Brewery.

And in this corner ... making a come-back in the 2007 Lexus Port Lincoln Bluewater Classic is the two time winner, Pale Ale Rager racing again – disguised as a Sharpie on steroids... or is it the first Heavyweight Sharpie.

'Sharpies are fast and wild – and that’s the attitude on Pale Ale Rager much of the time,' says David ‘Devo’ Shanks, designated sailing master for this wild bunch heading for the Tuna Town.

'It was late, someone called out ‘let’s do Lincoln’ and up shot about 40 hands for starters wanting to come ... and then someone said – ‘we need a boat’ and Gazza says, ‘got one – a giant Sharpie’ – and the rest will be history,' says David.