Inter State Trips | Phil Yeomans

North again, then North West

June 5, 2017 Leave a comment

With the close of the Summer sailing season and a slowdown in the on water volunteering, it’s back on the road. The last couple of weeks, I’ve been up in southern Queensland doing the rounds of the marine industry showing off new products.

I spent a few days on the Gold Coast first up doing the rounds, taking in a boat show and attending the opening of an Australian Sailing Team base at Southport. With the range that DeckHardware distributes, there’s always something new and this trip was all about getting the word out there.

Thursday afternoon saw me at Southport Yacht Clubs base at Hollywell, where Mat Belcher has set up a base for the Australian 470 squad. Middle Harbour Yacht Club is the home base for the Australian Sailing Team, however this is a first for a class to have its own home. Southport will give a variety of options with the local tidal flow and the ability to go offshore for race training without the Sydney Harbour ferries impeding. I guess that it will also free up a bit more space on the MHYC deck for the other classes as Tokyo2020 nears. When finished, they will have the ability to house under cover several fully rigged 470s.

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Over the next third of the trip it was up to Brisbane and what seems to be a regular visit to Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron to have a look at the rebuild of Defiance. Craig is doing a wonderful job and along the lines of do it once and do it properly. His only time span is to have it ready for summer. Since I last looked, it would appear to be minimal change, but to the keen eye, one can see the differences. His next step is to remove the engine and V Drive and replace with an updated model, this will make heaps of difference. Robyn and I can only grin when we think of the days of sailing in and out of the old MHYC marina. One thing that did strike me this trip was just how small she is. How did we manage to fit everyone in for a week aboard for the likes of the RSYS annual cruise? Then there are the memories of the Two Handed racing in the early 80s, it was easy because she is small and the gear easy to grab.

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The final third of this trip was up to the Sunshine Coast, not really a bad thought in a Sydney winter. The only difference was waking up to the early morning fog, it did clear up pretty quick though to a few brilliant days. Once again it was nice to catch up with everyone and for those who I didn’t see this time, I’ll be back north again soon.

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This coming weekend is another road trip, this time North West for the 49th annual Keepit Kool regatta at Lake Keepit near Gunnedah. On previous occasions I’ve been there’s been little water, less than 15%, so with the current level of over 60% it’s hoped that everyone who has been before will return and those who haven’t make the most of the opportunity. Fresh water sailing at a country club on a Lake that is 2/3rds the size of Sydney Harbour in volume. The photo below shows the water in 2014 way down there. At over 60% there’s certainly a lot more room and I’m glad I’m not laying and pulling up the marks as it’ll be a lot deeper!

I’m looking forward again to the clubs hospitality and the evenings yabby racing. Who else is coming?

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Filed under Assorted, Australian Sailing Team, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips, MHYC, Race Official, Yacht Race Tagged with Boat Show, Lake Keepit, Road Trip, sailing

2000 here, 2000 there

March 28, 2017 Leave a comment

A couple of weeks ago I headed south again, down through the Snowy Mountains and out to the coast to Wallagoot Lake. This road is quicker than going via the coast road. It’s all pretty good road until you have to come down Browns Mountain with all of its hairpin bends and slow corners.

Wallagoot Lake Boat Club is situated in a National Park and as such there’s no power. Dinner on Saturday night at the club is under candle light and torches, but a typical country club where everyone jumps in and helps including myself on the end of a tea towel drying up! It was good to see 4 of the Jindabyne guys come down from the mountain too, having been there only two weeks earlier.

Out on the water I learnt something new with their local weather conditions. When a sea breeze is forecast, wait as in hurry up and wait. I tried to get some racing in on the last of the overnight land breeze, nope, too hard. Once the Nor Easter kicked in it was great, settling in at a nice 10-12knots and reasonably steady. The locals here have GPS marked courses for the typical conditions, so setting courses was easy. NorEast course please. We had the usual mixed fleet from Sabres and Lasers with NS14s being the larger, through a mix of trailer yachts. Unfortunately the Multi’s were non-existent this time around with only Tim bringing his Hobie17 down from Jindabyne.

The host club had arranged for me to stay with one of their members for the couple of nights at Pambula Beach just south of Merimbula and this was greatly appreciated, especially waking up in the morning and looking out over the river mouth and towards the open ocean. One thing that you have to look out for there is the locals standing in the middle of the road seemingly without a care in the world or of a car coming towards them. They just take over the road and the verges and slowly hop out of the way as you come down the road.

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The next trip was up to Queensland, going in the other direction for a change. This time I made sure that I saw a few out of the way DeckHardware customers. It’s always good to catch up with these and they always take the time to make sure that they are fully up to date with all of our product range, it’s nothing to spend an hour or more with them. I thank them for their time, showing the new products as well as many of the others available.

For the first time in my driving life I had to drive through a section of a flooded highway. Northern NSW had coped the states maximum rainfall for the previous couple of days and the section at New Italy just south of Woodburn was in trouble. We all take it for granted that we’ll get somewhere at a certain time, no problems. At my second attempt, I followed a four wheel drive and got through the knee deep water over the road. Those heading south weren’t so lucky, there would have been 30-40 cars stuck in the deep water. When the authorities say don’t drive through flooded roads, don’t. Larger vehicles like the van and four wheel drives had no issues, but some of those stuck heading south, just shouldn’t have tried. On the return south there was little sign of what had happened days before.

I dropped into the Boat Show at Coomera on Saturday. On Sunday, I spent some time at a couple of the local sailing clubs, seeing how they do things and there is always someone there that I know!

I usually stay with my Aunt and Uncle on the Goldie and Geoff especially likes it when I come as the Sunday night takeaway variety increases, I always have a chuckle with this one. Monday morning however I woke up feeling quite ill, it wasn’t the food as the other two were fine. The pain didn’t decrease and after talking with Robyn and seeing a local GP, I headed south having only seen a few on Monday morning. Hopefully my next trip will be less eventful.

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Some of the mixed fleet at Wallagoot at Wallagoot

At the end of the day

Here it comes!

Filed under Assorted, Boat Show, Inter State Trips, Race Official, Yacht Race

Out on the water

March 10, 2017 Leave a comment

It’s been a couple of full on weeks. A fortnight ago I was in Jindabyne running the annual Snowy Mountains regatta on a freshwater man made dam built for the Snowy Mountains Scheme after World War 2. The dam is huge with more than enough area to run a decent size course. There is only one obstacle however when laying marks, the flooded original township below! Luckily there’s an area that’s marked as a no go zone for anchoring.

Saturdays racing was marred by the distinct lack of wind, something that does happen from time to time at any event.

After waiting ashore for most of the day, the start team went out and had a look when there was the makings of something on the lake. I came up with the idea of a short fun race. Amazingly it was a course that they hadn’t thought of in the past in Jindabyne. An all-in start, out around both islands and the ‘no go markers’ and back to the start /finish line. Easy eh? Except that you could go either way, clockwise or anti. Certainly made a few think, course length was the same either way, so which option? Most went anti, however it was the ones who went clockwise who made the most of the breeze. Everyone finished quite tight and all enjoyed the change.

Sunday was a little different, we had wind! So two quick races were held and what was to be a longer third was shortened back to the same as the others as the wind dropped. So we had results, everyone had a good time and once again the country hospitality shone, not to mention the benefits of sailing in freshwater.

Last weekend was the annual Middle Harbour Yacht Club’s Sydney Harbour Regatta over two days. Usually I run the Adams10s and another One Design class, this time however we hosted the Sydney38 Championships with three overseas crews and several more from both north and south of the border. We then added the Farr40 class for the weekend as well. Racing was planned for Offshore on the Manly Circle. Friday we went out and in some very challenging conditions ran 3 races for the 38s. The breeze swung all over the place depending on the clouds coming through, over 100 degrees during the day making things quite difficult.

Saturday was totally different. Due to an East Coast Low pressure system, both seas and wind were up. I took the start boat out to the heads and it was far too dangerous to send any one offshore. There was also no way that I could anchor the boat, or course marks, let alone see them! Seas through the heads were as big as I’ve seen in a while. So inshore with all the other courses, somehow managing to get a 1nm beat. More races completed. I would have loved to have a photographer on board as some of the finishes were spectacular, let alone some of the broaches. The Farr40 Estate Master came through the line surfing at nearly 20knots, the major issue of course was dropping it in time on a lee shore.

Sunday, things had calmed down somewhat due to the overnight westerly which knocked the head off the seas. So back out to the Manly Circle and a nice south wester averaging 16-18knots, perfect. I made the one bad call that I haven’t done in a while, I thought the breeze would swing left which is the norm. Instead it stayed in the south west and went even further right. My mistake was not giving the mark boat room to lay a course as I had laid the bottom mark too close in. Unfortunately the second race became a bit of a one way track, lesson learnt. I had to apologise to the competitors over the VHF.

It was probably the hardest three days on the water as a race official, the East Coast Low really put paid to that. Previous years have been just nice NorEasters and one can only hope for that next year.

Now it’s off to Wallagoot Lake Boat Club for their annual regatta. Wallagoot is another lovely little country club, situated just north of Merimbula on the far south coast of NSW. A small volunteer run club with 2 or 3 of each class using the yardstick for handicaps. At Jindabyne we use a common wing mark on the triangle, at Wallagoot the multihulls like their reaches so there’s a wider gybe mark for them. More mark laying but the monos and multihulls are separated making it easier on them. One of the things that does happen at these country events, is showing off the new products from our suppliers. These guys don’t have a chance to touch and feel much of the products now available, this is their chance to ‘tart up’ their boats with new lines from LIROS and boat and sail repair kits from DrSails.

Next week it’s back on the road in the van, north to Queensland for 10 days or so. Plenty of new products in the DeckHardware range to show around. Forespar have a range of new lubrication products and Allen Brothers also have some new fittings. It’ll be pretty busy.

Early morning at MHYC’s beach

Filed under Assorted, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips, MHYC, Offshore sailing, Race Official, Yacht Race Tagged with DrSails Forespar Allen, Farr40, Liros rope, Road Trip, Sydney Harbour Regatta, Sydney38

On the road south

February 24, 2017 Leave a comment

The Australian Wooden Boat Festival held Bi-Annually in Hobart is a must for any boat owner. Sounds like a big call but it is. Whilst the modern composite racers may think otherwise, here’s evidence as to how boat building and the sport of Sailing has evolved. The Festival had everything, marinas full of classics both power and sail, halls and marquees of products on display and for sale. Then there were the Tall Ships to go aboard, HMS Tenacious, the James Craig and at least a half dozen more. More than anything else this is the place to go and look at boats and boating stuff mixed in with a little history, simple.

Everyone who also travelled from the mainland that I saw agreed and there was plenty of us. Hobart does this well, there was even a park off Salamanca Place that was purely for entertaining the younger children as well as a school boat building competition. Like all major events, there’s road closures and parking hassles, but this event is free to wander around. So who else will be in Hobart in February 2019?

Last weekend was the final round of the Flying Eleven State titles at Manly and there was a great fleet of over 80 entrants from around NSW and some even coming down from Brisbane for the weekend. Saturday started off with a great southerly that then went East and soft before the forecast afternoon storm arrived. They got in two races before the hail and rain put a dampener on things. The storm also created issues for the classes 50th Anniversary Saturday evening function, luckily the organisers were able to move inside Manly Yacht Club and the majority stayed reasonably dry. There were of course the smattering of former Flying Eleven sailors who had gone on to greater successes at National, World and Olympic events. Those who couldn’t make the evening sent their apologies and a few memories of what the class meant to them growing up. Two former national champions in Nicky Souter and Malcolm Page even caught up in Austin Texas and sent a selfie. Melissa did some live footage so they were able to stay in touch with proceedings on the night. An evening enjoyed by all who attended, well done to those who helped arrange.

This coming weekend is the first of many in a row back out on the water watching some close racing. First up is the Snowy Mountains Regatta at Jindabyne, a fresh water event that’s only cold if you capsize. The last few years have been blessed with great conditions, this year may be a little cooler and damp according to the initial forecasts. I hope not!

After that it’s the Sydney38s as part of the MHYC Sydney Harbour Regatta, more great racing to watch, this time over three days and the Farr40s joining for the weekend.

Queuing for the Tall Ships

Working with LIROS Rope

A busy Derwent River

Sunset over Bass Strait

Constitution Dock

Mt Wellington sunset over Hobart

Filed under Assorted, Boat Show, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips Tagged with Hobart Wooden Boat Festival, Liros rope, Road Trip

So that was 2016

January 3, 2017 Leave a comment

It’s always a point of discussion in the office as to which event to attend or when to hit the road and show off new products now available from DeckHardware. This was the case with heading south recently. I was going to go north, but in the end north and south got swapped around as discussion grew about Sail Melbourne.

So off to Melbourne and surrounds for the week, this time driving about 1260kms over the 10 days. I arrived in St Kilda, home of the last Southern Hemisphere World Cup of Sailing and Sail Melbourne for the invited classes on Sunday and as was the outcome for the next week with the exception of one day, spent my time answering questions and assisting DeckHardware ambassadors and members of the Australian Sailing Team. Each afternoon after seeing DeckHardware customers from Sorrento to Geelong it was a return to St Kilda to see how everyone was going. The last few times at Sail Melbourne, I was on either the start boat or mark laying, so it was good to sit back and spectate and comment on what was happening. Naturally I had a few new products to show and everyone loved the new LIROS rope now available, it was very much a case of get in the queue for the Pink.

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As is the case in going to various clubs, there’s always a boat or two that I haven’t seen for a while. In this instant it was at Hastings on the western side of Western Port Bay where I came across a rack of Lasers. The incredible thing was that I’d built seven of the thirteen back in the 70s. I don’t know how many were still used but they must have been built pretty well to still be around.

I’m always grateful for my friends around the country who put me up when I’m around. My Melbourne hosts John Eyles and Sharon Rae again came to the fore with their hospitality. I’d sailed with Eylesie on many of his Indian Pacifics through the 70s and 80s and many stories are told over a glass of wine at dinner. Sharon has always been an excellent host but this time it was John stepping up with his efforts in the kitchen. I’d return to be told “we are having so&so for dinner and I hope it’s ok”. His apple pie was to die for, unfortunately leftovers for the following night were spoilt by Howie their little black four legged pie snatcher. Howie had obviously been watching John all day and wanted his share. I was informed that under no circumstances to pay him any attention as he was in the bad books. No evening walk up the street and back that night for the two of us.

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I finished up in Melbourne by watching the medal races for the Olympic classes on the weekend. What was good however, was having the big screen showing the on water footage and commentary by Malcolm Page. Most of the time you listened and turned around to watch if something was happening on the course. Plenty of spectators, as well as those who’d finished racing like the 49ers and NACRA crews.

Then it was time for the Hume Highway and a little drive home to Sydney.

Boxing Day is of course known for two things in Australia, the Cricket Test at the MCG and the Rolex Sydney Hobart Start. This was to be my 10th as the Race Officer on the second line, taking over from the late John Hurley as the MHYC team leader. With a seasoned team on the Pin End [Steve, Toby and Phil], we tend to just do it when afloat. This years invited guest was Tony Outteridge, who for those who sail on the Lake is usually found as the Wangi Sailing Club Race Officer. This was Tony’s first time on the harbour on Boxing Day for many years and first on a start boat. Something totally different to what he’s used to, with the Super Maxis on the front line and the dozen or so TP52s that we had on the second. This year we didn’t have a clear start with a few boats pushing the limit on the pin end, Individual recall on the centre line! The other lines were clear, lucky them. As was pointed out to the competitors in the race briefing, the Hobart isn’t won in the harbour, there was plenty of room further to windward on the line.

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One competition we have on the day, is to count the number of helicopters above. Last year we had 20, so on the guess sheet everyone was around that number. We were all disappointed to see only 10 for 2016.

So that was 2016 and a little bit of ‘I’ve been [nearly] everywhere’. Where I didn’t go in 2016, I’ll more than likely go in 2017. There’s more regattas and races to run and I might put aside some time to go for a sail a bit more often.

Filed under Assorted, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips, Race Official, Yacht Race Tagged with Melbourne, Road Trip, Sail Melbourne RolexSydneyHobart, travel

Another 3000kms

October 20, 2016 Leave a comment

Well almost, 2970 over the last week up to Queensland and back. I left home early Saturday morning and stopped by Mannering Park Sailing Club en-route. They had a couple of events at the same time, one for 14′ Catamarans and the other for O’pen Bics. Both had good numbers of entrants. I spoke with a couple of fellows who had driven from Griffith in central NSW with their Maricats. I was unaware that they sailed out there, but yes there’s a good fleet of mixed boats that sail on Lake Wyangan and plenty of water currently too.

It was then off to the Sunshine Coast for a few days, just another few kms. I caught up with an old mate Roscoe and we spent Sunday arguing with the TV coverage of the Bathurst1000 V8 Supercars. We were both on the ‘same page’ so it was a bit of fun.

Monday morning it was off to Noosa, an hour or so away to start the week seeing DeckHardware customers, both old and new showing off some of the new product range. It’s also good to catch up with many of the builders, riggers, sailmakers and chandlery owners as many have become pretty much good mates who I see out on the water too.

As is the case with many of these trips, finding out who is doing what, building something out the back etc opens up the talk. Having a range of products from dinghies to yachts and being interested in general is a break from the long drive. One new build is an 8m carbon foiling catamaran being built in a backyard. The owner has a couple of sheds but now that it’s almost together it’s under a shade cloth outside. Torture boarding and spraying to come, hopefully they’ll be sailing in the New Year with the focus on Airlie Beach and Hamilton Island regattas mid-year.

On Tuesday at the end of the day, I met up with a fellow Sailing Anarchist, American yachtsman Bill [BJ] Porter who is cruising the world with his family on a HalbergRassey. It’s taken several years to get to Australia, arriving in Brisbane from New Caledonia only a few weeks ago. ‘Eventide’ will be coming to Sydney for the Christmas – New Year period and I look forward to showing them around our great harbour.

Wednesday morning saw me at Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron going over a familiar boat in detail. Some time ago I was contacted about the IOR Sparkman and Stephens 1/2 tonner Defiance. This was the boat that Robyn’s father owned when we first met. We spent many years racing and mucking about on her so it was good to see the effort that Craig the new owner is putting in to keep Defiance going for another couple of decades.

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Craig started out to do a minor tidy up but like all things the job list has grown. Defiance had been ashore for nearly 10 years unattended, but was still in reasonable nick due to the craftsmanship of her builder Doug Brooker. The plan is to get her down south for Christmas with hopefully a stop over at Middle Harbour Yacht Club and show her off. He did say that if it was still a NorEaster that he’d keep going south. We’ll see. I’d love to sneak in a quick sail.

Another friend who I caught up with was Mark Gray, who with his wife Jules have provided a comfortable bed on several occasions in Brisbane. So much that his dog ‘Beer’ will cuddle up to me, “Chardy’ not so keen but a little wary. Mark’s sailing these days is as a delivery crew on Beau Geste80 and the Volvo70 Giacomo, his stories of sailing at high speeds on these maxi yachts. Always good to see them and they look after me well.

As is the norm on these business trips, it’s non stop during the day. However it’s the variety of people that I see and the range of products that DeckHardware can offer mean it varies greatly. I can be talking to one customer about plumbing and the next about TuffLuff foils.

One great change in the trip north is the roadwork being done. Various governments have promised upgrades from the two lane highway that it’s been forever it would seem between Sydney and Brisbane. There are now bypasses from the smaller towns, although I’m sure that their economy has suffered as a result from lack of travellers. What has hit me is the ‘Rest Stops’, whilst these are large and relatively clean and tidy facilities, there’s no shade. The older style are clearings amongst the trees off to the side of the road and are a delight to stop at and have a little ‘shut eye’. I hope that in time some of the landscaping at these new ones will offer the same shade, or that they see fit to build some sort of shade structures for those who use the facilities.

I’m back out on the water this weekend, it’s the first round of the Farr40 events for the season. Two days of racing so it’ll be interesting especially given that Team Transfusion will not be sailing. The former World Champs will only be doing the States and Nationals this year. Current forecast is for strong winds, so setting a course will be interesting.

Filed under Assorted, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips, MHYC, Race Official, Yacht Race Tagged with Defiance, Queensland, Road Trip

Time for a little reminiscing

October 5, 2016 Leave a comment

I’ve been told that my first time sailing was being put in a 505 spinnaker bag whilst still in nappies. Dad [Peter Yeomans] was a lifelong sailor having grown up at Vaucluse and sailing VJs at the local yacht club. He then continued sailing 14’skiffs whilst studying in the USA where he met my Canadian born mother.

Upon returning to Sydney, they settled at Newport and Dad was sailing at ‘The Alfreds’ with George and Tim Clarke in a Dragon, KA44. In the early Sixties he started building his first yacht on the front lawn and at the same time building me my first Manly Junior Pipsqueak. Needless to say I learnt heaps about building boats whilst helping Dad, be it painting and varnishing, the other end of a copper Rib rivet or steaming the ribs in an old 44. I sailed as much as I was allowed as a kid growing up and this continued when we moved to the waterfront at Bayview. Dad sailed Temeraire in many JOG events both out of Pittwater and Sydney Harbour where I often joined him as a crew. I can remember on one occasion, Dad dropping me and a couple of school mates off at Lavender Bay to sail her back to Pittwater, we would have been 16 at the time.

I sailed two MJs, updating Pipsqueak to Leucothea when the Mk2 design came in. From there I crewed on many yachts at RPAYC, midweek and Saturdays whilst sailing F11s at RPAYC, then Fireballs and 505s at BYRA. Upon leaving school I started work at Performance Sailcraft Australia building Lasers. Initially we unpacked containers of boats from Canada before the moulds arrived from New Zealand which had started production before us. Naturally sailing Lasers was a must and over the next 7-8 years I competed in many events in Adelaide, Melbourne, Brisbane and Yeppoon also including many NSW country regattas like at Wallis Lake near Forster. My first Aussie built boat was 14127 and the last of many, 70000. These were great years and many of my opposition have become lifelong friends.

I delivered new Lasers up and down the east coast, although one trip was made to Darwin. PSA had two specially built trailers, one held 6 boats and the other 10. With another employee Les, we towed the larger of these to Darwin in mid ’75, six months after Cyclone Tracy demolished the city on Christmas Day. It was one of those eye openers, I hadn’t been there before, nor had I really experienced or seen the power of nature. Les and I arrived around Midday and the locals wanted to go sailing, so we did. Unpacked the car and trailer and went sailing. We had written on the outside packing before leaving – Instant fleet just need water. Tick.

I spent a year working in Brisbane in the mid-70s and continued sailing Lasers and whilst there bought one of the first Windsurfers to Queensland. Upon returning to PSA in Sydney and then working at Sydney Sailboat Centre, I met Robyn and as they say, the rest is history.

I moved from RPAYC to MHYC and commenced sailing both inshore and offshore on a variety of yachts. Robyn and I started campaigning a Farr6000 which SSC imported from NZ. We had a lot of fun over a couple of years with our third crew Marita Wilmot. Soon a change of occupation gave me added days on the water and I rarely missed a Wednesday for 20 years.

Filed under Assorted, Inter State Trips, JOG, Yacht Race Tagged with Junior sailing, Laser, regatta, Road Trip

Half a drive

July 26, 2016 Leave a comment

I spent a few days last week down in Adelaide. Melissa had driven down the previous week to do some umpiring at Goolwa, about an hour south east of Adelaide. Her first drive to South Australia, a full two day trip and unfortunately she had a bit of rain and overcast conditions on the the way, so didn’t really have the chance to check anything out en-route. The rain that she had left water on the side of the highway and green paddocks which I’m sure the farmers would have appreciated. It was still there for me in many places, one spot just west of Wagga Wagga would have seen it over the road.

Mel met me at Adelaide Airport on Sunday morning and I took her for a drive around town for her first trip to SA, so she could get an idea of the surrounds, before returning to the airport for her to fly home.

I spent a few days in Adelaide doing the rounds, seeing a few customers, both old and new. Always good to catch up with the old and putting a face to the name for the new. It’s always interesting meeting new customers for the first time and talking sailing in general. Sometimes it’s funny, the links – “do you know?”. Plenty of stories from both sides.

The last stop for me was down in Goolwa, which necessitated a different route back to the highway. Thinking as I went “right, now I know where I am..”.

In the coming weeks we have a couple of events on that will keep everyone awake watching our Aussie sailors compete in Rio2016. We certainly wish all of them the best, stay safe and sail fast. After that I know I’m off to Perth for a few days, by then our season will have been in full swing. The 2016-2017 season already upon us? Where’s the year gone?

Here’s a few pics from the trip.

Hay Plain looking back

Glenelg from the air

Multihull in build

Van at Goolwa with the Mighty Murray mouth in the distance

Sunrise on the Hay Plain

Filed under Assorted, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips

More of the same, sort of

April 14, 2016 Leave a comment

It was back out on the water at Middle Harbour Yacht Club with the State titles for both the 420s and the Cadets on the same track. This time I did something a little different with the courses.

Both classes like a triangle with the windward and return, so rather than put the Start boat in the middle of the course for the windward returns [as is the norm], I kept the bottom gate above the start line with the wing/gybe outside on the extension of the start line. The last mark was to leeward of the start finish line. This gave the boats some short laps with a couple of ‘hoon’ reaches with a work to the finish. The thing is the sailors enjoyed it too, nothing better than keeping the customers happy. They had almost a couple of sprints to start off with before stretching their legs. I was also able to keep track of all of them easily.

Crossover at the bottom

Clear Start

Where else would you be?

Next up was the Sydney Sailboat Expo held at the ICMS grounds at Manly’s North Head. Spectacular location, the home of the Great Gatsby in the most recent movie. Built in the 1880s and standing proud on the hillside, all the visitors commented on the historical building. The Expo showed of a range of businesses in the marine industry including of course DeckHardware. As part of this we also sponsored the Liros rope splicing with two of the best showing the skills required. Cameron and Ben for the second year had people viewing and learning the art of rope work. I was told after closing that one of our Rio2016 Olympians spent quite some time there without being recognised. Good stuff.

Kids big and small

Early morning looking over Manly

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The weather also behaved for the two days, with glorious sunshine and nice seabreezes on both days treating the over 50 exhibitors kindly.

With that, that’s about it for the 2015/6 Sydney sailing season, there’s only a couple of weeks to go and then the Winter series starts in early May. I’ll be back on the road seeing DeckHardware customers again showing some of our range.

Filed under Assorted, Boat Show, DeckHardware, Inter State Trips, MHYC, Race Official, Sydney Sailboat Expo Tagged with Liros rope

The Farr40s

February 3, 2016 Leave a comment

After nine days on the water and with some 34 races started and finished, that’s it for the Farr40s at Middle Harbour for this season. Next up for them is their World Championships also to be held here in Sydney but by the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. It’s been a hard but enjoyable couple of months out on the waters of Sydney Harbour. The volunteer race management team have again done a professional job with the Fleet happy with the racing provided.

As is usually the case, the typical weather conditions weren’t there. We had drifters and blows with only a few of the races in a nice summers NorEaster. From our view it was great racing and those who hadn’t watched how the Farrs line up and do their start were impressed, full speed and hiking right on the line as the flag’s dropped. Yes we had the odd individual and general recall but you have that in any fleet. As always there’s a few ‘bombed’ gate mark roundings, too late with the headsail hoist and/or spinnaker drops. We saw spinnakers go under the bow whilst leading, ending up with the boat having to back off in order to get it back on board. It’s always nice though too, to see the polished roundings, pole away and the brace hand held till the drop. The volunteers who come out now and again always pick up and ask ‘why do they do it that way?’. When you watch it week in and out, it’s routine, however those who only watch now and again pick up how the top crews do it. The start team of course are all experts.

Good luck to all the MHYC teams at the upcoming Pre Worlds and Worlds, I’m sure many will be on the podium.

Before the two final weeks of Farr40s, I had a weeks trip to Victoria in the DeckHardware van on another road/sales trip. This time I went via the coast, stopping on Saturday at Lake Wallagoot. It had been around a year since I’d been there running a Yachting Australia Race Officers course, so it was a chance to see what and how they implemented some of the ISAF/WS rules. Like most, for a small club they have a core band of enthusiasts taking it in turns to be the mark layer and starter for the day. Looks like I’ll be down there again in March as they’ve asked me to run their annual regatta.

On Sunday I headed in to Paynesville to drop off an order to Hills Marine. Of course there’s always new product to show.

From Monday through to Thursday, I went anti clockwise around Port Phillip Bay, seeing a range of customers both old and new showing some of the DeckHardware product lines. Thursday afternoon it was time to head north as there was some yacht racing on the following weekend. Another 2787 kms on the odometer.

In the coming weeks, there’s another lot of regattas. Some I’m officiating at and others where the DeckHardware van will be there in support.