Mr Kite seeking offshore hat-trick in Bruny Island Race

by Peter Campbell on 5 Feb 2010 Tasmania's most advanced ocean racing yacht, Andrew Hunn's Mr Kite, will be looking for a hat-trick of line honours victory this summer in Tasmania's three longest offshore races when she sets sail on tomorrow morning in the 84th Bruny Island Race.

The light displacement, canting keel 40-footer originally designed by UK-based Australian Andrew Cape, has had her best ever offshore racing season since under-going extensive hull, keel, rudder and rig modifications designed by Hobart naval architect Fred Barrett.

The new-look Mr Kite scored a hard-fought line honours win last November in the 189 nautical mile Maria Island Race and followed this with a more comfortable victory in the 485 nautical mile Launceston to Hobart Race.

The Bruny Island Race, Australia's oldest long offshore/inshore yacht race, has attracted 31 entries for the 89 nautical mile circumnavigation of the elongated island south of Hobart, starting off Hobart's Castray Esplanade at 9.30am on Saturday.

'This will be a tough race to win.Mr Kite is the smallest boat of the line honours contenders,' said Barrett, who is also a regular member of the crew. 'We will be up against boats like, Helsal III, Doctor Who, Auch and The Fork in the Road.both bigger boats, but at least we will be the lightest displacement 40-footer in the fleet,' he added.

Joining Fred Barrett in Andrew Hunn's topline crew of Mr Kite will be Josh Clarke, who sailed aboard the British maxi yacht ICAP Leopard in the recent Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race, and Stephen 'Rowdy' McCullum, winner of the John Bennetto Medal for Offshore Racing at last year's Tasmanian Yachting Awards.

While Mr Kite, David Bean's Auch and The Fork in the Road (Gary Smith) also rank good prospects for IRC or AMS handicap wins, the other strong handicap contenders include Sally Rattle's Archie and Dianne Barkas' Sullivans Cove Whiskey, both past winners, David Creese's Dekadence, Whistler, skippered by David Rees, and David Taylor's Pisces, along with the Kaiulani, Malcolm Cooper's well-performed 30-footer.

First conducted in 1898 by the Derwent Yacht Club which became The Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania just over a century ago, the Bruny Island Race is a demanding combination of ocean and inshore racing.

The fleet can face a great range of offshore winds and seas in Storm Bay and down Tasman Sea coastline of Bruny Island, while in the d'Entrecasteaux Channel they will have the challenge of currents and tides and flukey breezes in the winding waters of the Channel.

Light to moderate south-easterly breezes have been forecast for Saturday following today's strong winds around the Tasmanian coastline.