Driter at Bruny Island start

by Peter Campbell on 6 Jan 2002 Race three of Tasmania’s inaugural Sailing South Race Week, around Bruny Island for the offshore racing yachts, around Green Island for the sports boats, has started in near drifter
conditions on the Hobart’s River Derwent.



An hour after the 9.30am start, many boats in the 56 boat fleet were becalmed, others making slow progress past the Garrow Light off Sandy Bay.



The former Volvo 60, Line 7 Lenna of Hobart, skippered by Sydney yachtsman Ian Treleaven, got the best start in clear air under spinnaker, avoiding a log-jam of boats at the leeward
end of the starting line off Castray Esplanade.



However, the wind died in mid-river leaving Line 7 becalmed along with another 25 boats, while the Sydney Hobart Race Overall winner, Bumblebee 5, skippered by Roger Hickman,
sailed around the shoreline of Sandy Bay to be first past the Garrow Light, with Hobart Ports Corporation chief executive Dick Knoop sailing well in his home-built timber cutter.



At 11am, an hour after the start, Bumblebee 5, with owner John Kahlbetzer flying down from Sydney especially for the Bruny Island Race, was one nautical mile ahead of the US
65-footer Icon, skippered by Jim Rose, with owner Richard Robbins having to fly back to Seattle today. Two miles astern came Line 7 Lenna of Hobart, with fleet already spead out over
several miles astern.



“We are sailing in about 5 knots of easterly breeze, having just dropped our spinnaker to go to a headsail, and we abeam of Taroona on the Derwent’s western shore,”skipper Hickman
reported from the 62-footer.



“In these conditions, it’s a matter of the rich getting richer,” Hickman added.



The two crewmen who went for an involuntary swim in the Derwent during yesterday’s race two of Race Week, Robbie Gough on Line 7 and Bruce Palmer on Icon, were back on board
for the Bruny Island Race, a 90 nautical mile circumnavigation race first held in 1898.



Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania principle race officer Rowan Johnston sent the bigger boats on a course that leaves Bruny Island to starboard, racing down the eastern shoreline to round
Cape Bruny before returning to Hobart up the tricky d’Entrecasteaux Channel this evening.



After two short races yesterday, Harold Clark’s Farr 1104, Invincible, leads the pointscore in the IMS division with a first and a second on corrected time, ahead of B52 (Hughie Lewis)
with a fifth and a third, T42 Solandra (Craig Escott) with two fourths and Bumblebee 5 (Roger Hicksman) with an eighth and a first.



Next, a Sydney 38 skippered by International Sailing Federation (ISAF) vice president David Kellett, won both races of the IRC division yesterday, with Breakaway (Wayne Banks
Smith) and Valheru (Tony Lyall) second and third in each event.



The PHS division saw corrected time wins yesterday for Fly’ Scud (Adam Goode) and Magellan (Dick Knoop) while in the Sports Boats, the winners were Tuesday’s Child (Steve
Walker) and Muir Race (Matthew Johnston in Division 1 and Canterbury Sailing (Fred Barrett) and Rouseabout (Grahame Inglis) in Division 2.


Major sponsors of Sailing South Race Week are brewers J.Boag & Son, the Hotel Grand Chancellor and the Tasmania Department of State Development.