Crown Series Bellerive Regatta - Twilight race overall

by Peter Campbell on 24 Feb 2012 Crown Series Bellerive Regatta, being held this weekend, started off with a twilight race for the keelboats and sports boats this evening. Tony Lyall’s ocean racing yacht Cougar II unleashed her remarkable boat speed in the opening race, her first round-the-buoys race on Hobart’s Derwent River.

The TransPac 52 had taken line honours in three long distance races in southern Tasmania since an impressive first-up performance in the 2011 Sydney Hobart, but this was the first time that Lyall and his crew had sailed the yacht in a harbour race.

Sailing in a five to eight knot south to south-westerly breeze, Cougar II totally outsailed the Division 1 fleet in the twilight race, doubling her lead over the two windward/leeward legs to finish more than 13 minutes ahead of the next boat, the Mumm 36 TasPaints (Ian Stewart) in a race that took just under one hour and 20 minutes to sail.

However, Cougar II was no match for the regular Group 1 racing boats on corrected time, finishing last under IRC ratings to the Farr 1104 Invincible (Harold Clark) and last to TasPaints under PHS scoring.

TasPaints sailed an excellent race to win the PHS category from Masquerade (Tony Harman) and fellow Bellerive Yacht Club boat, Jeff Cordell’s Host Plus Executive, which is also a Mumm 36.

Invincible also won the AMS division, for which Cougar II is not rated, winning from TasPaints and Host Plus Executive. Don Calvert’s Intrigue got caught up in a leeward mark rounding incident with an SB3 which was sailing the same course, costing the Castro 40 dearly and she placed on sixth in AMS and fifth in IRC scoring.

While Cougar II had no competition for line honours in Group 1, racing was intensely close in the Farr 40 division between Andrew Hunn’s Voodoo Chile and Stephen Shield’s Wired.

Voodoo Chile was carrying a brand new 3DI mainsail, identical to that used by Wild Oats IX in the recent Sydney Hobart and the latest in sail design and construction by North Sails.

She led Wired by 10 seconds at the leeward mark the first time round and went on to win by 40 seconds, third place going to Hughie Lewis’ Tilford Auto Group.

Group 2 race went to Silicon Ship (G Clark/D Wyatt) from Hot August Night (Nat Morgan) and Wildfire (Team Wildfire) which took line honours in this fleet.

The twilight race was an invitation event for the SB3 and sportsboat groups which will decide their Tasmanian state championships as part of the Crown Series Bellerive Regatta over the next two days.

Toll Shipping (Nick Rogers) scored a runaway win in the SB3s from Balios (Michael Wilkinson) and Wedgewood (David Graney).

John Herbert’s Stealth won the Sportsboats from Fred Barrett’s Fang to the Max and Ellusive (Roly Huddlestone) while the Trailable Yachts invitation race went to TP Big Girls (James Carey) from For Play (Tristian Gourlay) and Priscilla (John Dryden).

Performance Cruising 3 saw a win for Greg Rowlings’ Another Toy from Hy Fibre (Warren Aird) and Street Car (Peter Bingham).

The Performance Cruising 6 fleet was the biggest group on the water with the Mumm 30, Cleopatra, skippered by Scott Sharp from the Huon Yacht Club taking line honours, but placed 12th on corrected time. First place under PHS handicaps went to Sagittarius (John Hall) from Insatiable (Lisa Guy) and Affinity (Rob Watchorn).

Ian Marshall’s Hot Prospect won Performance Cruising 6 on AMS scoring from Wings III (Peter Haros) and the syndicate owned Easy Street.

Cruising division 7 went to Halcyon II (Kit Weber) from Temeraire IV (Rick Ware) and Patience (Tony Schofield) while Cruising division 8 saw a win for Valsheda (Brian Bick) from Vite (Bob Wilson) and Feeling Swell (Robert Gavin).

Cougar II heads a record fleet of 111 keelboats, sports boats and trailable yachts contesting the weekend-long regatta, an event first held in 1854 and which has been revived in recent years by Bellerive Yacht Club and Lindisfarne Sailing Club.

Joining the keelboats and sports boats on Saturday and Sunday will be nearly 90 off-the-beach dinghies and catamarans.

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