RMSIR race 1, as slow as treacle in January

by Guy Nowell, Sail World Asia on 19 Nov 2007 You can read that as July if you live in the southern hemisphere, anyway it describes a very slow race. the start of the Raja Muda Selangor International Regatta 2007, called the Raja Muda for short.

Established in 1990, the Raja Muda is Malaysia's oldest keelboat sailing regatta and one of the region's premier events,

This years opening race started in Port Klang, it was a slow start to what turned out to be a very slow race. Pedestrian is one word that springs to mind, and sedate is another. However, in just a few knots of breeze RO Jerry Rollin sent all classes away on a one-mile leg to a windward mark in the mouth of the Klang estuary, and then the combined fleets were off on the 90nm haul up to Pangkor.

The first start gun was at 1300 hrs, and boats later reported moderate sailing breeze of 8-10 kts for the first couple of hours, but by 1700 hrs there were quite a few engines on ïin those classes permitted. The wind came and went, and for the strictly sailors it was a long haul up the coast trying to either stay in the tidal stream or keep well out of it, and trying to hold on to a weak north-easterly off shore breeze that was fighting against a north-westerly sea breeze that was trying to establish itself.

Sirius 1935 was obviously trying to give Dato Richard Curtis' Eveline a more than fighting chance in Class 6 (Classics) division when she parked on a sandbar up towards the windward mark, on a falling tide, and was obliged to wait it out until the water came back again.

After an interesting plan B start that saw Ray Roberts Quantum Racing cross the line at the back of the division, tactician Steve McConaghy said 'it was a bad race in which to get caught behind: one short leg up to the windward mark, go over on to port, and then trying to drag race the rest of the course on the one tack.' Quantum reported two encounters of the fishing net kind, and they were not the only ones. Geoff Hill's Strewth fell foul of the nets, and so did many others.

By something near 1800 hrs Jelik, Frank Pong's 76 foot Reichel-Pugh, expected to take Line Honours for the race, still had a substantial number of boats only a mile or so behind her, and was suffering in the light airs. 'We like pretty much anything over 8 kts' said Pong, 'and a lot of the time we sailing in a good deal less.'

This wasn't the slowest Raja Muda opening race on record, but it came close, with Fred Kinmonth's Mills 51 Mandrake crossing the finish line at 0444 hrs next morning after 15h 09m of racing, some 15 minutes in front of Jelik. Kinmonth said the secret was 'the Code 0. We were on the edge of a wind line, behind Jelik, and we just sailed gently past her.'

Quantum Racing had a continuous battle with the other DK46 on the course, the brand new straight-out-the-box Janda Baik belonging to Khairul Shahril, Chairman of DK. 'It was all about being far enough inshore to get the north-easterly, and then being able to get out to the north-westerly. We got caught in the middle,' said McConaghy, 'and watched them sail away from us.' Janda Baik took handicap honours with a corrected time of 19h 07m 12s.

With a cut-off time of 26 hours, two boats failed to finish, and another two retired. Dr Basil Diethelmï's Sarabande was last home inside the limit, beating the clock by a mere 13 minutes. Even Sirius 1935 got a finish, but scored last in Class 6 after motoring for 13 hrs out of an elapsed time of 22 hrs.

Boats trickled in through the early hours of the morning and the next day, and it was a remarkably quiet breakfast with the hornbills at the tranquil Seaview Resort.

Crews arriving around midday livened up the scene somewhat, and by evening the party was in full swing. Regatta Director and GM of the RSYC, John Ferguson, nipped smartly through the prizegiving with his usual dry comments.

This morning the sailors are well fed and watered, and very shortly the hornbills will have the breakfast table to themselves once again as the caravan moves on to Penang.

	RACE 1 RESULT
		Class 1		Start Time	13:35:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points
19	MAS193	Janda Baik	Khairul Shahril	1.213	5:20:45	15:45:45	19:07:12	1	2
6	HKG2166	Fortis Mandrake	Fred Kinmonth & Nick Burns	1.281	4:44:27	15:09:27	19:25:00	2	4
10	8889	Quantum Racing	Ray Roberts	1.208	5:49:39	16:14:39	19:37:23	3	6
18	HKG2228	Microlab Moonlight Shadow	Adam Ng	1.302	5:30:35	15:55:35	20:44:10	4	8
23	MAS5201	Zuhrah	Razali Mansor	1.305	5:51:17	16:16:17	21:14:03	5	10
5	HKG600	Jelik	Frank Pong	1.462	4:59:24	15:24:24	22:31:28	6	12
		Class 2		Start Time	13:20:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points
20	GBR703R	Yasooda	Hans Rahmann	1.375	6:46:26	17:26:26	23:58:51	1	2
41	MAS2005	Resolution of Whitby	Neil Williamson	1.103	12:21:54	23:01:54	25:24:14	2	4
38	NZL8818	Intrigue	Dr Ian Nicolson	1.323	9:35:12	20:15:12	26:47:43	3	6
47	MAS75	Alis	Martin Axe	0.982	DNF			####	12
15	MAS9109	Virgo	Dato' Alex Nah	1.058	RTD			####	12
		Class 3		Start Time	13:15:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points
13	JPN7777	La Samudra	David Lindahl	1.015	9:29:57	20:14:57	20:33:10	1	2
25	AUS 4100	Australian Maid	Dr Jon Wardill	1.184	7:11:40	17:56:40	21:14:46	2	4
7	MAL3581	Impiana	Andrew Findlay	1.067	9:29:12	20:14:12	21:35:33	3	6
24	MAS5202	Zuhal	Khairuddin Mohamad	1.305	5:51:24	16:36:24	21:40:18	4	8
17	6188	Strewth	Geoff Hill	1.159	8:58:44	19:43:44	22:51:57	5	10
39	HKG1507	Walawala	John Blay	1.117	9:47:49	20:32:49	22:57:03	6	12
44	1770	Sarabande	Dr Basil Diethelm	0.994	15:02:20	25:47:20	25:38:03	7	14
		Class 4		Start Time	13:10:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points
34	SIN 340	Aquavit IV	Robert Howison	0.992	10:07:08	20:57:08	20:47:05	1	2
21	MAS88	Skandia	Gerry Firth	1.019	9:48:15	20:38:15	21:01:47	2	4
56	SIN5625	Lunchcutter II	Keith Dunn	1.061	9:02:41	19:52:41	21:05:26	3	6
14	MAS219	Blue Royale	Tony Sobey	0.897	14:32:39	25:22:39	22:45:49	4	8
22	MAL2000	Mata Hari	Vincent Chan	1.062	10:56:10	21:46:10	23:07:09	5	10
16	MAS8972	Tropicbird	Michele Pippen	0.996	12:50:01	23:40:01	23:34:20	6	12
26	MAS1104	Mat Salleh	Neil Ankcorn	0.961	DNF			####	22
35	MAS401	Leopad Dream	Jega Muniandy	0.918	DNF			####	22
2	GBR 8121 T	Skybird	John Kara	0.931	RTD			####	22
45	MAS303	JCCRE Jandi	Jeremy Camps	0.828	RTD			####	22
		Class 5		Start Time	13:05:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points	Engine
54	SIN101	Jenny III	Peter Jones	1.034	9:23:46	20:18:46	24:15:38	1	2	2:06:00
12	HKG 8155	Tui Tai	Jon & Sandra Stonham	0.870	12:18:51	23:13:51	26:01:05	2	4	4:27:00
11	AM 1014	Panacea	Dave Moxey	0.892	13:38:54	24:33:54	27:18:31	3	6	4:02:00
8	C264	Coup de Soleil	Malcolm Elliott	0.939	14:09:31	25:04:31	29:24:52	4	8	4:10:00
1		Blue Jay	Jay Jarvis	0.837	13:54:23	24:49:23	33:07:22	5	10	9:50:00
28	HR53	Rascal	Gavin Welman	0.900	1:40:09	12:35:09	20:26:23	6	12	6:45:00
33	K8830Y	Scipio of Parkstone	Gerry Bryant	0.854	8:09:55	19:04:55	30:11:41	7	14	10:51:00
49		Rainbow Dream	Simon Piff	0.987	7:50:12	18:45:12	36:16:32	8	16	12:00:00
		Class 6		Start Time	13:05:00
Hull	Sail No	Yacht	owner/skipper	TCC	Finished	Elapse	Corrected	POS	Points	Engine
3	OOTB	Out of the Bag	Don McGrath	0.850	7:19:13	18:14:13	21:52:35	1	2	5:00:00
9		Eveline	Dato' Richard Curtis	0.650	11:46:45	22:41:45	24:44:46	2	4	10:15:00
32	B1	Merpati Putih	John Mitchell	0.650	7:23:58	18:18:58	26:01:36	3	6	14:29:00
4	none	Sirius 1935	Simon Morris	0.850	11:46:57	22:41:57	36:31:41	4	8	13:31:00