Sydney City Marine Winter Series, Race 3

by Brendan Rourke on 25 May 2011 Sydney City Marine Winter Series, Race 3 was conducted by the Middle Harbour Yacht Club.

We thought Hughie was having a quite weekend last week but we now think he is on holidays.

For the second week in a row there was little wind come start time for the race. The race committee after much discussion decided to AP the race. We all played follow the start boat as they decided where to set a course.

Finally after a half hour break the course was the North East course #1.

The wind finally came in from the North East at about five to seven knots. Division #1 gave a good indication of the need to go right. Those that went right did much better than those that went left. At Cannae it was a kite run to Eastern Channel Mark. Most of the fleets went right towards Middle Head. A couple of yachts stayed left working the South Head shore. This worked well early but was very costly as the fleets closed in on the mark. It was a shy kite run across to Chowder Bay with most yachts having to drop the kites early and reach into the mark.

The fleet split into three groups, those that went far right to South Head, those that worked the middle and those that sailed the Middle Head side. The sides paid off with those in the middle suffering. As the fleets approached Cannae the fleet seemed to have decided to take the straight line towards Middle Head heading for Chowder Bay. Those yachts flying assos had good angles and fared well for once.

The next leg was a work back to Cannae with the fleets splitting up in all directions. It was with much relief that the Start Boat was seen on station at the mark. It was a shortened course much to every ones relief. And what a confused result with Division #1 yachts finishing behind Division #2 yachts.

The forecast for next week is similar.

Results:

Division #1

PHS Series - MRZ (Phillip Rowe) from Nine Dragons (Bob Cox) and Neat Engineering Wailea (Neil Padden)
IRC Series - Nine Dragons from MRZ and Kerisma (Grant Dawson, Brent Lawson)

Division #2

PHS Series - Merlin (John Lehmann) from Lunchcutter II (Keith Dunn) and Jessica Rabbit (Bruce Millar)

Division #3

PHS Series - Heart of Gold (Geoff Charters) from Wildfire (Grant Dawkins) and Bacchus (Bob Bennett)

With the cooler weather upon us, the Sydney City Marine Winter Series Jackets and Vest as weekly prizes have been put to good use.

Middle Harbour Yacht Club welcomes casual entries, to enter visit here