18ft Skiffs - Spring Championship, Race 7
Sunday, 18 November, 2018 - Sydney Harbour
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Simon Nearn's R Marine Pittwater took out today's final race of the Spring Championship series on Sydney Harbour today, but it was the young Rag & Famish team which became the 2018 Champions when the team finished just one point ahead of Finport Finance after seven action-packed 3-Buoys races.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Although the race was sailed in a light Easterly breeze, which faded over the latter half of the course, there was no shortage of action and continual lead changes to satisfy the spectators.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Despite trailing in eighth place at the end of the first lap of the course, the R Marine team of Simon Nearn, Cam Gundy and Brandon Buynil revelled in the fading breeze over the final lap of the course and raced away from the fleet to score a two minute and 27 second victory.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Appliancesonline.com.au (Brett Van Munster, Phil Marshall, Kurt Fatouris) also finished strongly over the final lap of the course to grab second place, 21 seconds ahead of series champion Rag & Famish Hotel (Bryce Edwards, Rory Cox, Jacob Broome).
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Finport Finance (Marcus Ashley-Jones) came home in fourth place, followed by Winning Group (John Winning Jr) and Noakesailing (Sean Langman).
Rag & Famish Hotel finished the series with an overal total of 31 points, followed by Finport Finance on 32 points, Smeg (Michael Coxon) on 42, The Kitchen Maker-Caesarstone (Jordan Girdis) on 51,
Appliancesonline.com.au on 52, and Vintec (Kirk Mitchell) on 53.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
Bing Lee (Micah Lane) began the race in great style and clearly led the fleet to the first set of 3-Buoys in Rose Bay.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
The 3-Buoys handicapping system took over when Bing Lee had to go to the 'Blue" marker which allowed The Oak Double Bay-4 Pines (Aron Everett) and The Kitchen Maker-Caesarstone (Red mark) to begin the spinnaker run ahead of Bing Lee.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
While the two leaders opened up a break over the fleet on the run to thw ing mark off Clark Island, the fleet behind them was closely bunched.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
The ever-unpredictable Easterly turned the placings on-their-head, so when the fleet finally reached the bottom mark off Kurraba Point it was Sean Langman's Noakesailing which now held a five second margin over The Oak, The Kitchen Maker-Caesarstone, Rag & Famish Hotel, Appliancesonline, Bing Lee, Finport Finance, R Marine Pittwater and Winning Group.
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Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
With the outcome of the Spring Championship resting on the result of today's race between Rag & Famish Hotel and Finport Finance, the second windward leg back to Rose Bay became a match race the pair as they headed the fleet.
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The winning Rag crew Photo: Frank Quealey/18 Foot Skiff League |
The Rag was strong in the light air getting into Rose Bay and she headed back down the long spinnaker to Kurraba Point with a 40s lead over R Marien Pittwater, Finport, Appliancesonline, Noakesailing and The Kitchen Maker.
The race looked all over as Rag & Famish Hotel sailed brilliantly to increase her lead by a further one minute and 20 seconds (two mins in total) over the challengers.
Drama struck as The Rag went to round the mark when a 12ft Skiff in another club's race took out The Rag, leaving the stunned crew scrambling to regain their spinnaker and get back up and racing.
The incident cost Rag & Famish Hotel one minute and 15 seconds and the race was on and, all of a sudden, there were four boats with strong winning chances.
It was all down to the final set of 3-Buoys marks, and R Marine Pittwater was the team to benefit most. Nearn and his crew were faultless with the spinnaker set and from that point there was never a doubt as the group completed the course from Rose Bay to Clark Island.
Frank Quealey
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