Malaysian Armed Forces confident of better sailing in Malaysian Open Q

by RURRUM on 2 Sep 2009 PUTRAJAYA: Following their early preparations this year, the Malaysian Armed Forces teams are confident of doing well in the Monsoon Cup Malaysian Open Qualifier, to be held on 23-26 November 2009 at Pulau Duyong, Kuala Terengganu.

Winner of the qualifiers will automatically gain a spot to compete in the Monsoon Cup, which is the final leg of the prestigious World Match Racing Tour being 1-6 December 2009, at the same venue in Terengganu.

As in the previous two years, the Armed Forces is once again sending two teams to compete in the Monsoon Cup Malaysian Open Qualifier. Skippers of the Navy 1 and Navy 2 teams, Mohamad Razali Mansor and Mohd Masyuri Rahmat expressed confidence in their teams’ abilities to do well.

'We selected the top racing sailors from all three divisions of the armed forces early this year, and since then we have been practising on the Farr platu 25, a 25-foot sailing yacht available at the Lumut naval base,' said Mohamad Razali.

He added that the crew members are fairly new to match racing and needed to be equipped with the skills and understand the technicalities required to compete in Monsoon Cup Malaysian Open Qualifier.

When the teams heard about the first Monsoon Sailing School organised by the Monsoon Cup, they immediately registered for the four-day coaching clinic held on 14-17 August, 2009 at the Putrajaya Lake.

'It has been a fruitful session for the teams as they were privileged to be coached by world-renowned match-racing trainers such as Bill Gladstone, Brad Sheridan and Charlie Enright,' said Mohamad Razali, who will be competing in the Monsoon Cup Malaysian Open Qualifier for the third time this year.

He expressed gratitude to the Monsoon Sailing School organisers for enabling them to polish their knowledge and skills in Match Racing and the experience that they got from this four-day course has boosted their confidence for this year’s MCMQ. They are hoping to defeat one of their biggest threats from 2008 Monsoon Cup Malaysia Open Qualifier, the KFC team skippered by Mohd Razman.

'This year we are putting in more practise time compared to last year, we have been prepping ourselves since early May for this year’s Monsoon Cup Malaysian Open Qualifier and we make sure we have at least three hours of training every week,' said Mohamad Razali, who joined the Navy in 1991.

He added that this time his team members gained valuable experience at the Monsoon Sailing School handling the F36 yachts, the same yachts used during the Malaysian Qualifiers and The Monsoon Cup.