Southwesterly winds that started off in the 8-12 knot range then steadily built to 14-16 knots enabled PRO Peter Reggio to complete three excellent races. In typical Farr 40 fashion, there were three different winners Plenty going wire-to-wire in Race 1, Struntje Light getting the gun in Race 2 and Enfant Terrible taking line honors in Race 3.
"It was a great day on the water. We had fantastic racing in great breeze on a beautiful southern California day," said Alex Roepers, skipper of Plenty.
World Championship runner-up Estate Master arrives on the circuit
The Italian boys aboard Alberto Rossi's Enfant Terrible are hoping for a repeat of the boat speed and crew work they displayed while winning the Midwinter Championship. Class president Martin Hill and the Estate Master team arrive from Australia looking to build on their impressive second place finish at the 2014 Rolex World Championship. Gordon Leon and his amateur crew sailing Foil are trying to represent host Cabrillo Beach Yacht Club by capturing the Corinthian Division.
27 March 2015
A “brain-boggler” second day at the Farr 40 nationals on Sydney Harbour is Transfusion crewman Will Mackenzie’s take on the five race outing where vexed tacticians made calls then crossed their fingers and hoped for the best, three different owners claimed bullets from five races, and there’s a new pointscore leader.
Andrew Hunn and Lloyd Clark’s Voodoo Chile is ahead by a six point break over Guido Belgiorno-Nettis’ Transfusion. Two wins for Gordon Ketelbey and tactician Sean Kirkjian shuffled Zen up into third, two points behind Transfusion, and makes them lead Corinthian entry.
“We are ahead but it’s not comfortable. It never is in this fleet, we push each other the whole way,” said Voodoo’s tactician David Chapman. Though Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron is his home club and he knows the harbour from north to south, Chapman found today maddening in terms of decision making. When a westerly breeze drops out to 5 knots then gusts under the Sydney Harbour Bridge at 20kts and flicks left and right, from WSW to WNW and back again, there is no harder job than a tactician’s.
“It was horrible. We just tried to stay in phase, sometimes even if you are in a lift or knock you have to continue with it to find a bigger shift,” Chapman said. “There wasn’t much of a pattern and it was very easy to get it wrong. It was great to see Zen get two bullets as class newcomers.”
Media Release
28 March 2015
It’s been a four year endeavour and this afternoon the Tasmanian crew on Voodoo Chile were declared Australian Farr 40 champions.
“We first came up to Sydney in 2008 and went away with our tail between our legs,” said a glowing Andrew Hunn, co-owner of Voodoo with his boat partner of eight years, Lloyd Clark. “In 2011 we finished top ten at the worlds in Sydney and decided we would build on that.
We are fully chuffed to have pulled this regatta off. It’s fantastic to get up because of the competition; I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a battle for second.”
Hunn said it was an honour to sail their final three of a 12 race series on Sydney Harbour in front of yachting legend Sir James Hardy and Farr 40 class manager Geoff Stagg, out from the USA for a site recce for next year’s Rolex Farr 40 World Championship in Sydney.
Media Release
26 March 2015
“You can’t win a regatta on the first day, but you can lose it,” reminds the leading Farr 40 skipper Guido Belgiorno-Nettis after day one of the Aberdeen Asset Management 2015 Farr 40 National Championship for the John Calvert-Jones Trophy.
He’s satisfied Transfusion is in a defensible position, yet a countback is the only mechanism separating the top Sydney team from the Andrew Hunn steered Voodoo Chile sailing for the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania after the opening four races on Sydney Harbour.
Smart tactical calls by Katie Pellew-Spithill and strategist Mike Leigh put the Middle Harbour Yacht Club based Transfusion, a five time Farr Australian champion and the defending Farr 40, into position for a couple of tremendous starts and picks of the track. Even when they were deep in the third race, good tactics brought them back from the brink into second.