HYC 1 CCYC 0! Results! 1st Young Entertainer (HYC) - double handed 2nd Phantasy (HYC) - double handed 3rd Eye Spy (HYC) 4th Firsty (HYC) 5th Gaucho (CCYC) - double handed 6th Appaloosa (CCYC) 7th Escape (HYC) 8th Waterwitch (CCYC) - double handed 9th Involute (CCYC) - double handed 10th Blue Beat (HYC) 11th Nona (HYC) 12th Satisfaction (CCYC) 13th Cracka (CCYC) 14th Six Gun Justice (HYC) 15 Mac Attack (CCYC) - double handed Best start 1st Appoloosa +0.00 seconds 2nd Satisfaction + 0.02 seconds 3rd Mac Attack +0.05 seconds Faster Boat around the course 1st Firsty 2nd Young Entertainer 3rd Appaloosa Thank you to the CCYC start boat crew on Footloose. And also thank you to the the support crew and photography team on Lady Claire. Race Report from Young Entertainer We decided to run two handed for the opening race of the Golden Rivet. Sailing Capitan Nigel Watkins and I had a plan to send Entertainer through the field and hopefully get in the way of a few of CCYCs fast boats. This would allow HYC fast boats to get in and have a go. The wind was forecast 10-12 knots but it moved around a bit and got to about 18knots at the start. We would have been over powered in 18 knots with our big sails and thankfully the wind dropped about 10 knots on our start! We had a poor start and got in the way of Nona so being the gentlemen we are we tried to stay out of their way. Once on the move Entertainer was feeling slippery and light and we made some ground on boats around us. Around Kauri Point the wind was light and from behind - the slowest point of sail for Young Entertainer. We tried a few things, gull wing, pole pole out, up a few degrees and all that happened was the boats behind us got closer. Thank god the wind move forward a few degrees and increased in strength. We are off again! We leave the kites behind and make a move for the mark. Around Rhona and we are up wind hunting for boats. This is where Entertainer was awesome. Perfect conditions and wind strength. We passed some friends and some foes and made a nice rounding at Pile and back to Rhona. Around Rhona and we are heading home. We need to pass three boats. We did it before Kauri Point and eased sheets around the corner and headed for the finish. Looking back at the finishers behind us.. - it looked frantic! Wow what a finish! We got the win and also second fastest boat around the track. Thanks to Nigel - hes still got it... Thanks to both clubs for getting out there and participating. Awesome BBQ and prize giving back at the club with thanks to House committee and Bar for all the hard work. Race Report from Six Gun Justice We were set for racing in the Golden rivet race one. We had borrowed nice clean spinnaker sheets from Young Entertainer (thank you Darcy) and rigged a down haul. By the time our awesome crew of Mike R and Christin arrived at the Justice we had the boat all set up, and all we needed to do was motor out of our berth. We were very early for the start.. early bird and all that ... Finally the rest of the boats joined us! We observed that how great it was to see such a good turn out; with eight HYC boats and seven CCYC ready to race. Our handicap was zero so we were first to start. Our start was not great, which was due to no fault of our own - CCYC's boat Cracka (for reasons we will never understand) decided to motor through the start line and then in front of us for our start grrrrrr .. I had slight moment of boat tourettes .. to which they were oblivious. My apologies to the start boat - but my ranting was valid!!! Anyway once we got over the start line we were smoking along getting up to 8.4 knotts (full main and No1 - not bad for the little Marauder! Being the first boat to start we had a great view of the fleet starting behind us. We got to the first mark first but we had Involute hot on our heels! Round the mark and then against the huge tide.. our speed dramatically slowed (bloody fixed prop grrr... similar to towing a very large bucket out the back of the boat). With our slower speed the fleet caught up with us. Around Pile we now had Gaucho and Involute in front of us, then back to Rona and another good rounding. Time to head to the finish line staying north of pile! We made a slight tactically bad decision and stayed way to close in .. not good with such a big tide and so nearly all of the fleet sailed past us. But I could not start my singing as we were not "all by ourselves!" we still had some of the fleet with us! We finally finished just behind Cracka with Mac Attack behind us. Not last but would have been more enjoyable to finish further up in the fleet. Lessons learnt for the next Golden Rivet on 5th December. Thank you to our awesome crew- who have promised to crew for the next two Golden Rivets.. so it can't have been all that bad on the Justice! Race Report from Eye Spy. The skipper was feeling poorly so the intention was for Greg to take Eye Spy out for the Golden Rivet # 1 as I sit in the warm close to the bar. Greg and JK talked me round and I joined the team with their comment “the skipper doesn’t do anything anyway”. How could I say no? Heading out to Eye Spy we see someone waving madly at us from the shore. Gill has made it…….nice one. So, with a team of four on board we head to Taikata to do battle with CCYC and are very happy to see a great fleet from HYC milling around at the start line. Some of the Mark-foy start times were a little confusing but we started fairly well along with others 11 minutes after the lead boats. Interesting these starts as the goal is to catch all the opposition boats in front all the while slowing those who may beat boats in your own team. Soon after the start the kite went up and the chase began. Down to Rhona, back to Chelsea, down to Rhona then finish. All went very well with kite hoists and drops though one was very close to Rhona which kept my crew busy. Appaloosa was making a charge at us around the same mark but got their kite hung up and slowed, allowing us to put another good gap between us. I expected they may still catch us on the long leg to windward. We could see Firsty and Escape making ground through the fleet and Goucho was the final CCYC boat in front of us. I know the SR26 is fast once the sheets are cracked. So we sat on top of him to slow him down so that Firsty and Escape might get past. The kites went up again 50 meters before the finish line resulting in HYC with 1st to 4th covered. Great result. Well done to all who competed. Great to see a fine HYC team out there. We have a couple more entries for Golden Rivet # 2. Hope to see you all back for seconds. Race Report from Firsty The first race of the Golden Rivet. Unfortunately some of our crew work on Saturdays. Both Tim and Wayne were unavailable. Dave Woodward and Lou Wipera both available and Keith Fleming made up a crew of 4. Sail selection was a challenge with the wind going from 8 to 18 kts, so we decided on the No3 headsail with the wind at 18 knots in the start area. It was a pretty lonely place in the start area waiting for our 19 minutes after the first boat away to tick by. As soon as we started the wind drops to 9 or 10 kts, so looks like the sail selection is a bit off on that. Lou was on the foredeck for the first time but he got the kite up as soon as we could manage it as we turned the corner. So with the Masthead kite up Lou was asked if we could change to the No2 headsil. Lou never being one to say no, obliged, then once completed a hoist of the headsail and an early drop of the Kite, just in case. It looks like we have a fair bit of ground to make up at the bottom mark but the tide is strongly outgoing so it’s going to make this leg a little longer. So that means a good bit of rest for Lou before the next kite hoist. At the top mark we have made up a bit of ground and we round on the stern of Nona and not far behind Satisfaction. It’s Lous turn to shine again as we run the masthead kite again for a quick downhill run. But with this outgoing tide we don’t even have time to drop the head sail. Satisfaction decides that they should come up and try to protect their wind. As they push us to windward, so we have no option but to bear away and go underneath into their wind shadow. Since we are not going to break through the lee, we opt for a conservative drop again and go around the mark outside of Satisfaction. As we go around we lose a little ground which enables us to tack immediately and get on with it. Nona is holding Satisfaction out to the left and not letting them tack. As we push to windward we notice that some of the boats ahead are knocking so we hold up as much as we can and lee bow the tide, then ease sheets to pass north of Pile buoy. As soon as we round Pile we change gear to start pointing as much as we can to try to get out of the brutal tide. Passing several boats on the uphill we find that Apaloosa has other ideas and with that beautiful Giddens headsail she climbs to windward to try to hold us out. Luckily we were able to hold them out and climb above them and keep out of the tide around Meola reef. As Apaloosa flew their Gennaker we had no choice but to fly an extra and we may still pick up another place so with Lou’s last challenge we hoisted the No2 kite to head for the finish. Within 1 boat length of the finish we just manage to get Gaucho for a 4th place. With Young Entertainer, Phantasy & Eye Spy ahead of us Hobsonville have secured the first 4 places in the first of the Golden Rivet. Thanks to Dave, Lou and Keith. Race report from Nona The day of the epic contest dawned cloudy, but dry and with 10 – 15 knots SW. We head up to the start line at Taikata with a crew of John, David and myself. A count of the boats present have 8 HYC and 6CCYC. A good number. Just before our start, the breeze is squirting at 18 knots so we do a hurried change of number one to number two headsail and head for the start gun. Naturally the wind dies to 10 knots and we hope this is not going to be for the entire course of Rhona, Chelsea red, Rhona and finish. We start with Young Entertainer , who at two handed employs the 3 minute dispensation. She soon begins to move ahead. Around Kauri Point, we note that Satisfaction is looming behind us so we best put up a spinnaker. We soon have our big blue up but also have Phantasy (sailing two handed) windward of us keeping pace and effectively taking our wind. Up and around Rhona and also navigating between the heritage yachts sailing out of Birkenhead, with Waterwitch and Phantasy getting there first it is down to Chelsea. We head back to Rhona without a kite and note Escape ahead make a radical course adjustment to avoid that big yellow thing called a racing mark. Satisfaction who is ahead also makes a defined course adjustment, away from the mark, up to Firsty who has a kite up. Thinking that this seems outside a “proper course” we decide if the occasion presents itself to annoy Satisfaction. The occasion does indeed present itself as they round Rhona just ahead but quite wide. We come inside and then head with Satisfaction (who by now is windward boat) over to Watchman Island. Calls from Satisfaction about water room illicit a negative response from us with the depth gauge reading 15.5 meters under our keel. Firsty slips through along with others as we find ourselves “getting some Satisfaction”. Our job done we tack and head for the finish staying out of the tide and closer to the wind pressure and also trying to avoid the heritage boats who have massive sail areas and booms longer than our boat. We manage to stay ahead of Satisfaction and finish 11th on the line. It was a good day, dry and it was impressive to see so many boats on this side of the Harbour racing. Many thanks to the CCYC start boat, John for the handicaps (please be nice for the next one), the HYC social committee for the burgers, bar staff and ALL competing boats, HYC and CCYC. Most of all thanks to my crew for an enjoyable day. NONa |
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