Go for Launch: GCCM Gold Coast Mackay Yacht Race 2025 entries now open!

GCCM Gold Coast Mackay Yacht Race 2025 © Southport Yacht Club

The countdown is on with today marking 175 days to Australia's newest ocean race, the GCCM Gold Coast Mackay Yacht Race kicks off on the 1st of August.

With the official release of the Notice of Race today, entries are now open for the 2025 race, which finishes during Mackay's highly popular Festival of Arts event.

Offering 520 nautical miles of spectacular coastal offshore racing from the iconic skyline of Australia's Gold Coast, the course sends the fleet around the outside of K'gari and weaves past many tropical islands of the Great Barrier Reef.

Organised by the Southport Yacht Club, Commodore Glenn Burrell said the timing of the Gold Coast Mackay race helps feed boats into the northern race weeks, such as those hosted by Whitsunday Sailing Club in Airlie Beach and Hamilton Island Yacht Club.

The Monohull Line Honours in 2024 was snapped up by Grant Wharrington's supermaxi Wild Thing 100 with an elapsed time of just 35 hours and 36 minutes, whilst Greg Alder's 50 foot Top Gun earned the Multihull honours just 3 hours later.

Grant Wharrington will be back in 2025 with a taller mast and wardrobe of larger sails, after purchasing Wild Oats XI's mast and a rigorous refit scheduled at the Gold Coast City Marina & Shipyard early 2025.

He's thrown down the gauntlet to other big boats looking for a thrilling long-distance race in warm waters to contest their inaugural Line Honours record.

Feedback from last year's inaugural race showed that skippers and crew were delighted by the spinnaker start and range of downwind surfing, whilst the absence of marks made for a navigators delight and tactical routing between the islands and reefs enroute to Purdue.

As one of the longest passage races for multihulls in Australia, Commodore of the Multihull Yacht Club of Queensland, Adrian Relf, said "With such a growing presence of raceable, cruising multihull yachts heading north for their annual cruising season or northern regattas, the GCCM Gold Coast Mackay Yacht Race presents a great challenge and logical option for multihull racer/cruisers."

Commencing after the Noakes Sydney-Gold Coast race, the GCCM GOLD COAST MACKAY YACHT RACE kicks off on the 1st August, with an epic start line off the beachfront, straight in front of Cavill Avenue, Surfers Paradise. Spectators on pleasure craft will be welcome.

Entries are now open to all Australian and international boats via the official race website, goldcoastmackay.com. Early Bird entries close Saturday May 10.