Even though the weather was not on our side the day was just as good as the last time we all got together.
The fleet made up of 3 all female and 10 mixed crews, with several Sydney 38’s, J24’s and Adams 10’s competing against each other. Nigel Holman was good enough to lend his brand new Match 42 Cuckoos Nest to an all female boat which was later renamed to The Harken Angels as Pam Fagence and Akkim Lim from Harken were on board with Halos for the crew and wings for their skipper Vanessa Dudley. Harken staff were also represented onboard the Match 35 Fordified by Greg Butchart who had flown in that morning after attending the Harken University in the USA.
Animus – Melissa Yeomans, was decked out with Tiara, sequenced and ribbon hair elastics with a token featherboa on the backstay as it was too wet to wear them. Marita Wilmot flew in from London that morning to present the crew with shirts embroidered with the Harken Logo and race name.
Uncensored – Simone Grout, the third all female boat also had bags of goodies but were unable to dress for the occasion due to the weather. Seeing this you would have thought that the onwater competitiveness would not have been of a high level. Well you soon found out this was wrong as once the start gun went off there were almost several collisions.
In a light easterly the course was set between North Head and Balmoral for three rounds with a very hard run in tide and a small confusing seaway to compete with. Nicky Bethwaite soon settled in and led around the Edwards Beach Mark.
The Commodore did not fare as well as they were required to recover from a MAN overboard incident. The two small boats of the fleet Innamincka and Kaotic (J24’s) kept intouch with the fleet of larger yachts in the light conditions to come 1st and 2nd in the mixed crew.
In the second half of the race there was some very close racing between many of the boats including the leaders This Way Up steered by Nicky Souter, Estate Master – Lisa Hill and Eve’s Delight – Nicky Bethwaite.
The Harken Perpetual Trophy was presented by their representative Robyn Yeomans to Animus steered by Melissa Yeomans. With the Ron Hyde Memorial presented to Innamincka steered by Amanda Cook.
We would like to thank MHYC, Oregon Scientific and Sturrocks for joining with Harken to make this a very memorable day for all.
Melissa Yeomans 