SLAM Kiwi Match – BBYC Match Race 1

by Logan Fraser on 17 May 2010
SLAM Kiwi Match were keeping it local this weekend racing down at the Bucklands Beach Yacht Club in the first of the club's match race regattas of the year. The club is in their third year of running the BBYC Match Race Series on the J24 class yachts. Each series comprises of three separate regattas throughout the year.

For this regatta, in an innovative move the club partnered with Yachting New Zealand's Woman's Olympic Training Squad. Yachting New Zealand providing their two brand new Olympic class Elliott 6m yachts to supplement the J24 yachts provided by the club. This proved a winning combination as the Woman's Olympic Squad got valuable training against some of the best local match racing teams, and coincidently we all got to try out these great new boats designed by local designer Greg Elliott.

Unfortunately things didn't quite work out on Saturday and we only made it to the end of the channel before an issue on the committee boat forced us back to the dock. This actually proved fortunate as a juicy squall rolled across Auckland with thunder, rain and 30 knot winds, so the call was made to head home and re-group on Sunday.

Sunday was a different story with sunshine, 15 – 18 knots and 7 teams keen to get in some sailing. We went into this regatta looking for a little bit of training and to spend some time in smaller boats in preparation for later in the year. In this respect the regatta was successful with a solid round robin of sailing on Sunday with some good close races in both the J24's and the Elliott 6's.

Because of the lost day on Saturday there was only time to complete a single round robin with the semi's and finals being cut from the schedule. Having lost only one race all day to Will Tiller and Will going all day unbeaten we were left in a similar position to Korea; needing semi's and finals to win the regatta. However it wasn't to be and we were left in second place which was a little disappointing. Although the regatta was more of a training run we were obviously still looking to win and will need to ensure we clean up the small mistakes we are making at times.

These regattas are a great initiative by BBYC and with the partnership with YNZ for this regatta it made it that much better. It is a great opportunity for new teams to try their hand at match racing without huge expense and a great training platform for teams looking to step up.

Thanks again to SLAM for their continued support, as this is an important period for Kiwi Match as we try and improve our world ranking and our profile. Remember to keep an eye on our website www.kiwimatch-sailing.com for updates, our blog, videos and more.