P Class and Starling National Championships under way

by Nickolas Radovanovic on 6 Jan 2011
The Tauranga Cup and Starling National Championship, hosted by Napier Sailing Club, kicked off today in light conditions with three scheduled races completed.

After a short delay, racing started in a 5 to 6 knot easterly breeze that slowly built up and swung slightly northward, averaging 8 to 9 knots, with the sea providing a small chop.

Tanner Cup runner-up Trent Rippey, from Tauranga, sailed very consistently today, taking a first, second and third, and jumped to a 10 point lead over Hamilton's Tanner Cup winner Isaac McHardie, with Wellington's Nick Thyne a point further back. Murrays Bay's Cameron Moss outsailed his more fancied clubmates, Matthew Hughes and older sibling Charlotte, taking out Race Three in the process to move into fourth place. Kerikeri's Petrina Sheldon sailed consistently and rounds off the top 5, while local hope Michael Hayton, will be looking to work his way up from sixth, showing his ability to lead the fleet on more than one occasion.

Rippey's lead, however, is all the more significant when considering today's conditions were not ideally suited to him and it would be fair to say that, even at this early stage, the chasing bunch will have their work cut out to peg him back.

Other notable P Class performers today are Hokitika's Patrick Haybittle, who took out RaceTwo and Carmen Haybittle, sailing an old 'put together' boat, including an aluminium mast, and yet managing, against the odds, to keep herself well off the bottom of the table.

The Starling Fleet is split into two flights and Waimakariri's Starling Match Racing Champion, Gareth Moore, has picked up where he left off, leading the fleet after winning his last race today to slip past New Plymouth's Gye Simkin, also racing in the blue flight and winner of RaceTwo. Match Racing third place-getter, Mahia Pepper, from Murrays Bay, took out the yellow flight's first race and sits in a familiar position, one point ahead of Kohimarama's Andrew McKenzie and Erica Dawson, also from Murrays Bay.

Wakatere's Jack Simpson will be ruing a start penalty in his second race that saw him drop nine points, effectively costing him the lead. However, he provided perhaps the highlight of the day, along with clubmate Matthew Kempkers and Royal Akarana's Ashleigh Lamberg, when they hit the finish line in Race Three of the yellow flight, separated by only three feet. Another highlight today was the match race for second place in RaceTwo of the blue flight, between McKenzie and Howick's Ryan Dixon. The pair enjoyed a gybing and tacking duel that saw McKenzie finally edge out Dixon by a foot.

Today's other winners were Taupo's Keith Inglis and New Plymouth's Paul Moriarty, lying seventh and eighth respectively.

Tomorrow's forecast is for slightly fresher northeasterlies and hot competition. Full results on pandstarling.org.nz