River Derwent sailors are a hardy lot.  On this wintry morning 32 yachts, with about 100 crew aboard,  contested Derwent Sailing Squadron/Cascade Winter Series with temperature in Hobart ranging between 5º and 7º during the race time.

Fortunately, the breeze did not come sweeping down from snow-covered Mount Wellington,  rather there was a steady 10 knot NNW that sent the keelboats around the course in just over an hour,  while the SB20s sailed two short races in about the same time.

The weather-wise Hobartians were well rugged-up against the wind-chill factor and all 20 keelboats and a dozen SB20 sports boats completed their races.

Rob Gough's Difficult Woman had a good sailing day, Photo Michelle Denney.

The SB20 fleet turned on close racing with George Peacock sailing Foreign Object to a one second line honours win in the first race from Rob Gough helming Difficult Woman.  Third across the line was Sudden Impulse (Richard Fader).

Under PHS scoring, first place went to Piste (Greg Rowlings and Paul Einoder),  with a corrected difference of 11 seconds to Foreign Object,  third place going to Sudden Impulse.

Rob Gough’s son James took over the helm for race two and scored a convincing win, finishing ust under a minute ahead of Wicked (Andrew Blakney) with Paul Burnell in Honey Badger taking third place.

Difficult Women had a top day, with first and a second placings in One-Design and first and a equal fifth in PHS.  Rob Gough is now second overall in the SB20 one-design scoreboard to Wicked (Andrew Blakney) after six races.

 

Big Ted (Tom Stearnes) heads the SB20 leader-board,  half a point ahead of Wicked.  Foreign Object is third in standings.

It was a winning day for series leaders in each of the three keelboat divisions,  each top yacht scoring a PHS win to strength their pointscore leads.

Ian Johnston’s Zephyr won Division 1 from Temptation (Steve Harrison) and Nexedge, helmed by Darren Clark,  one of the syndicate that now owns this boat.

Zephyr, with two wins and a 5^th, is on 7 points, comfortably clear of War Games (Wayne Banks-Smith) on 12 points, with Temptation on 15 points.

Another Toy,  the Latham Syndicate’s J24, has now won all three Division 2 races, today scoring from Vasco (Graeme Harrington) and Wildfire (Jon Ettershank).  Another Toy has 3 points on the board, Wildfire 8 and Vasco 13 points.

Graham Hall’s Serenity also cracked a hat-trick in Division 3, winning today from Dynamo (Stephen Davidson) and Kindred Spirit (Peter Alcock).  Serenity has 3 points, Dynamo 8 and Kindred Spirit 9 points.

Peter Campbell

24 July 2016

 

Hobart’s Friends School has won the 2016 Australian Secondary Schools Teams Racing Championships at Goolwa, South Australia, contested last week by 60 young sailors from schools from all States and Territories.

The Friends' Blue team of three boats,  helmed by Silas Hamilton, Morgan Davies, Hugo Hamilton and Jasmin Galbraith and with crews Ethan Galbraith, Finn Buchanan and Issy Declerck, won the final against Westminster School from South Australia.

In a day of light and testing conditions they were the dominant team all day, winning their quarter final and two semi finals convincingly before winning the best of three final 2:1.

All members of the winning team are prominent Hobart club dinghy sailors as well as actively representing their school in weekly team racing on the Derwent.  Many of the team are members of Sandy Bay Sailing Club.

Friends Blue was one of six Tasmanian teams in the 24 team competition, with four of these teams making the final series after 336 qualifying races at the four day event.  Competition was in Pacer one-design dinghies.

Friends' White finished 4th, Hutchins Gold 8th, Guilford Young College 9th and Hutchins Magenta 10th. The Fahan School finished second in the girls' event losing their final to St Joseph's of South Australia.

The Friends' Blue team qualified for the Australian championship after winning this year's Tasmanian title, which was sailed on the Tamar RIver at Deviot in April. Their win at the national event entitles them to represent Australia at the Pacific Rim Championship to be held in New Zealand later this year.

This is the first time the Friends' School has won the National Championship, but with more than 60 sailors from the school participating in team sailing they certainly have a strong future ahead of them.

Peter Campbell

18 July 2016

Senior management of the Derwent Sailing Squadron, manager Shaun Tiedemann and sailing manager Mike Denney and their yachts, today took out first and second places in Division 1 of Bellerive Yacht Club’s Tilford Auto Group Winter Series.

In a duel around the course in a light to moderate northerly breeze on the River Derwent,  Mike and Michelle Denney’s Wild West beat Shaun Tiedemann’s Philosopher across the line by just 17 seconds.

On corrected time, victory went to Philosopher, the former Sydney based yacht, her first win on the Derwent, the margin here being 68 seconds from Wild West.

This winter,  DSS club manager Tiedemann and his youthful crew are racing Philosopher in the DSS series and, across the river in the BYC series.

Sailing manager Denney obviously can’t compete in the DSS Winter series but is enjoying the Division 1 racing with Bellerive.

Line honours went to Ian Stewart’s Mumm 36 Tas Paints which recovered well after being over early and having to restart, and then forced to the Eastern shore.  Tas Paints placed third on corrected time. In close racing, just over a minute separate the first four boats at the finish.

Today was a classic winter morning for racing on the river, with Hobart’s ‘Bridgewater Jerry’ (a fog that moves down the river) making its presence well and truly felt.  In fact, the city and main harbour were blanketed in thick fog from dawn until it began to lift just before the race start time.

Racing finished with conditions bright and sunny, but with a high wind chill.

Peter Campbell

10 July 2016

 

Competition is really gingering up in the SB20 Winter Series being conducted by the Derwent Sailing Squadron as part of its Cascade Winter Series on the Derwent with prominent names in Hobart racing today figuring in exceptionally close racing.

Former Sharpie champion Frazer Read, world champion in International Cadets in this teens, Paul Burnell,  current Moth masters world champion Rob Gough and Michael Cooper, who last month finished third overall in the Portuguese national championships filled the top scratch placings in the two races sailed today.

Cooper, along with Phil Reid (Mind Games) plan to contest the world championships in Portugal in August/September.

The highly competitive racing in winter augers well for a spectacular summer of SB20 one-design racing on the Derwent with a fleet of 40 boats predicted as Hobart sailors look ahead to the worlds here in 2018.

Conditions provided for excellent one-design racing,  a 10-14 knot NNW with gust to 20 knots-plus with 14 SB20s competing along with 22 keelboats in three cruiser/racer divisions.

First race for the SB20s saw just of a minute between the first seven yachts, with Pinch (Frazer Read) leading the fleet home, 14 seconds ahead of Honey Badger (Paul Burnell) and just one second to Difficult Women (Rob Gough).

On PHS scoring, Pinch won from Honey Badger by one second on corrected time, with third place going to Alice Grubb at the helm of Big Ted.

In race two for the SB20s,  Rob Gough held off a determined bid by Export Roo (Michael Cooper( by 17 seconds with Andrew Blakney’s Wicked four seconds back, in third place.

On PHS scoring,  two more prominent yachties took top honours,  with Richard Fader steering Sudden Impulse to victory from Yachting Tasmania’s sailing personality of the year, Hughie Lewis, at the helm of Nautilus Marine.  Rob Gough came in third.

Overall, on the day,  Gough had the best results on scratch, a third and a first,  while Export Roo had a fourth and a second.

Division 1 victory went to Steve Harrison’s Thomson 7 sports boat Temptation from the classic 8-metre Juana,  with Jock Young on the helm, third place going to Shaun Tiedemann and his young crew of ex-dinghy sailors in Sydney 36cr Philosopher, sailing its first race with the Squadron fleet.

Philosopher, with her youthful crew,  gave Wayne Banks-Smith’s Farr 40 War Games a run for her money around the course,  but the bigger boat finally pulled away to take line honours from Philosopher.

Division 2 saw an outright win for the J24 Another Toy (Latham Syndicate) ahead if Wildfire (Jon Attershank) and Hornet (Neville Georgeson).

There was another outright win in Division 3 with Serenity (Graham Hall) winning from Cool Change (Chris Bobbi) and Kindred Spirit (Peter Alcock).

Peter Campbell

3 July 2016