Melbourne Missive
By Secretary. Filed in News |
Melbourne Missive No 2: Reports for race 2 and 3
” Due to an impending weather system that is potentially going to bring strong northerly winds on Tuesday and Wednesday the race officer brought forward the start of race 2 to 12noon on the 11th January and also indicated an intention to hold race 3 immediately afterwards. Noon arrived with light variable winds under a grey sky. The locals expressed confidence that the clouds would burn off and bring a return of the 20 to 25 mph sea breeze we all enjoyed on Saturday. This was not to be. After a 30 minutes postponement race 2 got underway with Barry Parkin GBR3911 well placed on the left. Steve Goacher GBR3821 and Grant Alderson AUS 3833 spent most of the race duelling for first and second. It was only in the last beat that Grant over did the protection put on Steve and allowed Barry Parkin to come through and take first place. The wind remained flukey throughout the race and presented challenging shifts for the championship fleet.
The local experts were disappointed by the wind today and we did not see any significant increase in strength for race three. Just before the start the wind shifted hard left and attracted most of the fleet to the pin end. The fleet struggled to get over the line and rafted. There was carnage! Four of the GBR team were black flagged including Howard Green, Charles Apthorp, Gill Browning, and Andy Goddard. Mike Hart GBR 3917 crossed the finish line first.However he lost a port/starboard protest and was lobbed from the race. Veronica and Ben Falat GBR 3799 led for the early part of the race and due to missing a shift dropped to third over the finish line, but were promoted to second place due to Mike Hart’s misfortune.
After three races Barry Parkin GBR 3911 leads the championship, with Grant Alderson AUS 3833 in second and Steve Goacher GBR3821 in third place with a spread of 5 points covering the three boats. We are expecting to compete in two races on Monday, this will put us in a position of completing 5 races by the end of Monday with three days to complete the last two races.”
Hope this is all OK. Regards Adrian
Over all results here