12ft skiffs: The Fraudster wins 2018 Nationals in Wellington
by Jono Clough 22 Mar 2018 22:13 PDT
23 March 2018
The Fraudster - 12ft Skiff class NZ Nationals - Worser Bay © 12ft Skiff League
The 2018 12ft Skiff National Champs were held at Worser Bay Boating Club in Wellington over the 9-11th March.
Five boats made the trip down from Auckland to join the Wellington fleet. With the first race starting at 4pm on Friday it enabled everyone to get there in time. The fleet was greeted with a windy Wellington southerly day.
Day 1:
The breeze was between 20 and 25kts so the fleet was sent out to race with the start just off the club. Everyone had opted to put their smallest rigs (4th or 5th) by the time the race started the breeze was up to 30 or even 35kts in the big puffs. Only 4 boats managed to start and get round the course. The Fraudster (Chris Skinner & Chris Holland) claimed first spot followed by AGAIG (Glen Armstrong & Rodger Barnes) and Monkey Wrench (Jono Clough & Hamish Hall-Smith).
With the breeze up, there were plenty of capsizes and fast runs to keep the spectators entertained. With the breeze still up the second scheduled race was called off.
Day 2:
A gentler southerly breeze was had on Saturday, three races were scheduled in the morning and two in the afternoon. Most of the fleet had their #2 rigs in for the morning races, Race 2 saw The Fraudster, Monkey Wrench and Ugly Stick (Simon Ganley & Oli Scott-Mackie) take out the top three positions in a moderate breeze.
Race 3 saw some OCS boats return and restart. The breeze was slowly dropping and was quite patchy in places making staying in the puffs critical for good speed. The Ugly Stick took the win from The Fraudster. Sharkskin (Shaun Sheldrake & Sam Bacon) had a good race to claim third.
Race 4. The breeze was continuing to drop with most boats single stringing up and downwind for the majority of the race. It’s the new black (Jason Parkin & Luke O’Connell) with their 1.5 rig had heaps of power and just managed to stay in front of the Fraudster to take the win. Ugly Stick sailed consistently to finish 3rd.
The fleet was sent in for lunch and as the breeze was dropping everyone changed up to their big rigs for the afternoon races. However by the time the fleet got to the start of race 5 the breeze was building slightly….
Race 5. With the building breeze there were a few flapping mainsails as the fleet sailed upwind. Monkey Wrench was first to the top mark, but gybed way too late in the run to let Ugly Stick and The Fraudster in at the bottom mark. This was the top 3 places at the finish.
Race 6. Monkey Wrench lead from start to finish, followed by Ugly Stick and One & In (Tim Bartlett & Matt Hix). The Fraudster had an uncharactistic swim in a gybe and retired from the race.
Day 3:
On Sunday there was a little morning breeze and the fleet once again put in there big rigs. With everyone ready to go the breeze dropped off completely so the fleet stayed ashore. At midday the breeze hadn’t returned so racing was called off and the final results from Saturday stood.
The Fraudster is the 2018 12ft Skiff national champion. Ugly Stick 2nd and Monkey Wrench 3rd.
The NZ12ft skiff group would like to give a big shout-out to Worser Bay Boating Club for an awesome venue and to Paul Davies and his team on the race committee and to all the volunteers for running excellent racing and onshore management.
See the NZ12ft Skiff Facebook page for more photos and banter. Local fleets are based in Wellington (WBBC) and Auckland (RAYC). 12ft – can’t be beat.