Winning family sailor proves his class at Hamilton Island

by Ian Grant on 23 Aug 2002 Teenage Sydney Harbour sailor John Winning 18 has added another important experience to his promising career by assisting his skipper and crew to achieve an outstanding fight back in the 2002 International Hahn Premium Race Week at Hamilton Island.

Winning considered as a kid in the craft of tactician in the tension packed class of one-design class racing has grown in stature and has gained respect from his more senior rivals.

Incredibly Winning had little experience in racing yachts before but his collective tactical experience gained from skippering one-design dinghies was applied to the race strategy that has promoted Cruising Yacht Club Of Australia skipper Hugo Van Kretschmar helming Bashful to a commanding lead in the highly competitive Club Marine Sydney 38 class title.

Crew technique and tactics are the necessary skills required to climb the 'pecking order' in all classes of sailing however they become more important and far more difficult in one-design sailing where all crews start racing with an equal chance.

Skipper Van Kretschmar his young tactician and the crew of Bashful are well aware that mistakes are critical when they were 'blown out' by Race Officials for a start rule breach in the opening race of the series.

Normally an error of this magnitude would cancel out any possible chance of winning the championship but the Bashful crew were not prepared to accept defeat.

The young tactician was in his element applying the tactics that started the title fight back in the 12-hour 80n/ml Coral Sea race last Sunday.

Bashful led the fleet only to lose the race win in the final mile when Winning casually said 'It's dark and how can I race against them if I can't see them'.

That comment impressed Van Kretschmar who has relied on the support of his crew and the race strategy of John Winning to enter into a tactical 'dog-fight' for the series against the Australian champion and dual Sydney Hobart race winner Lou Abrahams in the Melbourne sloop Another Challenge.

Bashful with her remarkable fight back leads the championship into today's 30 n/ml Baynham Island race by a commanding 15 points from Another Challenge with another 7 points to Wayne Kirkpatrick's Hamilton Island Yacht Club crew in Asylum.

Both skipper Van Kretschmar and Winning realise they must improve on their 2-1-1-2-1-1 score and avoid any rule infringements to keep their title hopes alive after incurring the maximum points penalty from the start of the championship.

The Bashful crew will have to sail smart and keep their point score clean in the final two races today and tomorrow before skipper Van Kretschmar can look at preparing his victory speech.

Progressive Points:-

Bashful (Hugo Van Kretschmar, NSW) OCS -2-1-1-2-1-1 596pts 1,

Another Challenge (Lou Abrahams, Vic) 8-4-3-2-3-5-2 581 pts 2,

Asylum (Wayne Kirkpatrick, Qld) 7-1-5-6-4-10-4 574pts 3,

AMI Jade (Peter McNamara, NSW) 3-3-10-9-6-2-6 571 pts 4,

London Tavern (Justin Lambeth, NSW) 9-8-2-3-7-3-12 568 pts 5,

Rush (Burns/Ellis/Williams, NSW) 1-11-12-7-5-8-3 566pts 6.