Southport Yacht Club represents at Airlie Beach Race Week!
by Virginia Riddle-Cross 24 Aug 2020 23:30 PDT
6-13 August 2020
Desperado, Black Diamond, B52 - Airlie Beach Race Week © Shirley Wodson
Southport Yacht Club would like to congratulate Graham Sherring (Desperado), Michael Small (Ocean Racer Chaser), Glenn Burrell (Black Diamond), Noel Hardy (Envy) and Dan Farmer (B52) for the results that they achieved during the Airlie Beach Race week 6-13 August 2020. Each racing team travelled over 2500kms including their crews, and it was a massive effort, particularly given the challenging circumstances and restrictions that are in place currently.
Graham Sherring, a veteran of the race (having competed in Airlie Beach Race Week roughly 15 times on his own boats and crewing for others) believes it is one of the best Regattas on the planet. "The weather was perfect, racing around all the islands up there was nice, and the camaraderie of all of the competitors is what makes this event special. Of course, it was a challenge with social distancing, but the event organisers did a great job of managing this."
Michael Small, on the other hand, competed in Airlie Beach race week for the first time. For Michael, it was very much a family affair, with his crew consisting of his wife Julie, his children Ella and Jackson and a family friend, Mike. "The experience of sailing around the Whitsundays was amazing. We went up there with no expectations. It was fantastic, and we can't wait to go back. It will be a yearly event from now on!"
Both Ocean Racer Chaser and Desperado competed in IRC against the big boys. When asked what the best part of the competition was, Michael said "The racing against Graham, racing next to each other all day every day, you couldn't separate us, which made it very exciting. It was an enjoyable week of racing against Graham in the same sort of boat, which made it very interesting."
Glenn Burrell and the team on Black Diamond also competed in Airlie Beach race week for the first time. The majority of Glenn's crew were SYC members, with 11 competing on Black Diamond for 3 days and 10 competing for the full four days of racing. When asked what the highlight of the event was for Glenn, he said: "I think Day 4 was the highlight for me as far as racing was concerned. We matched ourselves with Team Hollywood and Envy Scooters and got a second-place that day.
Apart from that, the crew got better and better every day, and by the end of it, we were a pretty well-oiled machine. The preparation that went into getting the boat ready, the efforts that Lee and Carlee from Deepwater Collective did in prepping the boat and my wife Karen and Carlee for making the crew lunches every day, we couldn't have done it without them."
Noel Hardy who took out first place in Division 1 Performance Cruising said of the event "We had tricky conditions because the winds were so light, sometimes you would sit in one spot and drift around in circles for half an hour, and then the breeze kicked in, and we tracked a few down in a few of the races. So it came down to the last race between me and Dan on B52 and unfortunately we both had our worst races that day, but he ended up with another 9th, and we were on 8th, so it was a countback for the series. It was good racing by Dan, and we were hoping if we couldn't win it that Dan would pick it up."
Dan Farmer of B52 said of the event: "We went out there, and we raced to win every race and just got better and better during the week, fairly well got handicapped out of the field, but that was because we were doing so well. Every race we went out to win it with line honours, not just handicap, we wanted to win it number 1 over the line. We made no mistakes which were an essential part of our sailing over the week, no tactical errors, for us that was a big highlight. It was a light wind Regatta, and B52 along with Envy are light wind boats, they prefer that rather than the heavy stuff.
Most of B52's crew are Southport Yacht Club members, and I would like to acknowledge them, without them, I've got nothing. 5 of our crew came up from Southport Yacht Club, 3 from Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron, 1 from Canberra and 1 from Sandringham Yacht Club, and I'd like to extend my gratitude to my crew".
"We'd also like to extend a huge thank you to SYC for their support of B52 and our race campaign at Airlie - with our Crew shirts we looked great and it just all came together for us. If you look good, you go good, and we did."
The overall results for the five SYC boats competing in the Airlie Beach Regatta were:
Envy - Noel Hardy 1st in Div. 1 Performance Cruising
B52 - Daniel Farmer 3rd in Div. 1 Performance Cruising
Desperado - Graham Sherring 3rd in IRC Rating Passage
Black Diamond - Glenn Burrell 5th in IRC Rating Passage
Mister Bojangles - Michael Small 6th in IRC Rating Passage
Congratulations to all of the boats that competed in this year's Airlie Beach Race Week, and we look forward to seeing more of the Southport Yacht Club fleet competing at Airlie Beach Race week in 2021.