Wot Now new leader in Audi IRC Series

by Di Pearson / Skandia media on 24 Jan 2009
Graeme Wood's Judel Vrolijk 52, Wot Now, is the new leader of division 1 in the Audi IRC Series at Skandia Geelong Week following the Passage Race from Williamstown in Melbourne to Geelong today.

Living Doll was the outright leader coming into the Passage Race, having come up with two bullets in the opening race of the Series on Port Phillip yesterday, but an oops by Michael Hiatt and his crew saw Living Doll named by the race committee as an early starter.

Having to return to the start line and re-start cost the Melbourne crew some time and first place overall, with a ninth place in the Passage Race, which has dropped them down a place to seventh overall. Hiatt was looking at protesting when we went to press.

Wood now has a relatively young crew, including Tasmanian Julian Freeman helming, match racing champion Michael Dunstan on tactics and Tristan 'Stan' Eldershaw navigating: 'Their young, ego free and quiet on the boat,' he said, confessing: 'I want to win the Audi! I want that nice set of keys so I can put them on the bar and pull chicks!'

A couple of changes in results appear to revolve around boats starting with L today. After sailing two windward/leeward races yesterday, Loki (Stephen Ainsworth) protested Limit (Alan Brierty) over a buoy room mark rounding incident.

Loki came out the winner. Limit, which was sitting third overall coming into the Passage Race, was disqualified from its second place in Race 1 and fell out of the top three. To add insult to injury, after sailing neck and neck in the Passage Race, Loki beat Limit home to win the race overall and she is now third overall.

Commenting this afternoon, Stephen Ainsworth said: 'We are very happy with the result. Today's race was a long work in short chop, but as we got further up the Bay, it flattened out. It was a good solid breeze at 18-24 knots.

Commenting on the protest result of Race 1, Ainsworth laughed: 'It has restored my faith in justice.

'They [Limit] infringed and the jury found in our favour. It was a fair result, but it's a shame for them that they have suffered a large penalty, which will affect their series. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.'

'We had a great start, good strategy and came through OK,' said Ainsworth's helmsman Cameron Miles. 'We really enjoyed this race; we went out early and tested a few jibs to see what we'd use.

'We've got a good all-round boat and Linksy (Chris Links) is doing a good job calling the shots and Michael Bellingham is navigating, it's all coming together well,' said an obviously happy Miles.

Limit, with America's Cup afterguard Gavin Brady and Rodney Keenan bolstering the crew, finished the race in third place behind Wot Now and is now ninth overall and already some 25 points off the lead.

Brierty and his crew will have to do a 'Lazarus' if they are to finish on the podium, with only three windward/leeward races remaining to be sailed on Corio Bay on Sunday and Monday. The two Reichel/Pugh yachts are close in size and on handicap and the clash has been going on since both were launched in December.

Another yacht not having the best time of it is the new Reichel/Pugh 47 Secret Mens Business, owned by Adelaide businessman Geoff Boettcher. Currently, Boettch is in 15th place and only one place in front of his old boat, now known as Shamrock.

Used to being at the front of the field, Boettcher is having problems with his yacht. 'We've got great speed downwind, but we're still lacking upwind speed. We?ve got Mal Hart (the builder) on the boat and he will be liaising with the designers to see what can be done, which should bring us into line with Limit and Loki,' said Boettcher, who was praying for a downwind race today. Sadly, it was all upwind!

Division 2 and 3 results are not available at this stage, as many boats were still on the race course, such were the conditions.

Provisional Results:

Division 1 top five after three races

1 WOT NOW Graeme Wood CYCA 6
2 LIVING DOLL Michael Hiatt RYCV 11
3 LOKI Cameron Miles CYCA 11
4 DEKADENCE Philip Coombs SYC 17
5 BLACKJACK Mark Bradford RQYS 19