Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club Spring Regatta day one

by Koko Mueller on 15 May 2011 Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club (RHKYC) Spring Regatta is being held on Victoria Harbour over the 14th and 15th May 2011.

The last major regatta in the RHKYC’s 2010-2011 season featured 92 boats from eight one-design classes, Sportsboats and two divisions of ‘Big Boats’, dual rated on HKPN and IRC.

Race Officer Simon Boyde could find only 6 to 8 knots south easterly in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour, so opted for a Hung Hom start with courses running west to east, taking in Tai Koo Shing and Shau Kei Wan.

With a trough of low pressure affecting the region, sailors were more than happy to get racing underway in dry conditions with the Big Boats leading the way at 1350hrs on a quick two lap course to Shau Kei Wan. A strong incoming tide caught some competitors unawares, with Stella, amongst others, doing a tack and a gybe after being carried onto Shau Kei Wan mark. Protests?

The largest fleet on the water by numbers was the Etchells fleet, and in spite of its reputation for close fleet racing, Ante Razmilovic finished first of 14 by ‘a country mile’.

As the skies darkened, a patchy breeze topped out at 10 knots. Tomorrow features two races back-to-back, with Wind Guru suggesting that the breeze will soften slightly and shift to the south while Hong Kong Observatory is banking on conditions remaining much the same.

The first race will get underway with the ‘Big Boat’ A Division at 1110hrs.

In first place after day one are:

Class	Boat	Helm	Class	Boat	Helm
Big Boats IRC A	Blondie IV	Helmuth Hennig	Impala	Rainbow Chaser	Wilcox Tam
Big Boats IRC B	Vixen	Peter McCaffrey	J/80	Tigrina	Andrew Moore
Big Boats HKPN	No One Else	Jack Ng	Pandora	Windfall	Tom Ho
Dragon	Maiden Hong Kong	Pierre Buet	Ruffian	Schannuleke	Edwin van den Berge
Etchells	Swedish Blue	Ante Razmilovic	Sportsboat	Merlin	Steve Bourne
Flying Fifteen	Squiffy	Suzanne / David

www.rhkyc.org.hk!RHKYC_website!