An Aussie Weekend

What a weekend! Saturday Morning as always started with the Sailing Chix on air. It was a big show full of AC talk and lots of Match Racing, TP52’s as well as the up coming JJ’s for the 18’s. There is plenty happening in the world of sailing this year that is for sure!

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Sunday was pretty big. My first umpiring event for the year was the Marinassess Women’s Match Racing Regatta, won by Kathleen Stroinovsky and her crew of Lucinda Whitty, Samantha Boyd and Kate Brown, representing the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. It was a very tricky day with the Southerly hitting early on and causing the breeze to be very shifty as well as changing strengths with the shifts. Women’s Sailing has come a long way in the last few years and we can thank the Olympics for including Match Racing at the London Games. It was great to see Lucinda Whitty one of our Silver Medal winners out there yesterday as that helps increase the skill of the competitors. It is also great as the atmosphere at the event was such a friendly one as well as being competitive. This goes for everyone including Competitors, Organizers, Race Committee and Umpires. It really felt like everyone was there to grow and improve as well as having a great time out on our awesome Harbour.

Leaving the CYCA I managed to get home to watch the last 1.5hrs of the Bathurst 12hour. The race could be watched online via the website which was AWESOME! The commentary was great to listen too as well. The weather was teasing so much with rain all around the Mountain making it extremely difficult to choose what car setup to go for. I can’t wait for the V8’s to start up with the new teams mixing it up a bit! Check out some of the video here. Apparently I missed an incredible amount of Safety Cars in the morning part of the race as well as some of the crazy rain that had them doing 40K around the track on the wrong tyres. I will definitely be checking out the highlight footage. Great effort by those who put together the coverage and did the Commentary. Loved it.

Now for another big week at DeckHardware followed by a full weekend of umpiring at the Pittwater High Schools Teams Racing this weekend up at RPAYC. Summer truly is awesome.

January 20, 2013August 24, 2023 Melissa Yeomans

16 Nationals

Yesterday I had the chance to head down to Manly to watch some old friends compete in the 16′ Skiff Nationals. Lee Knapton and the crew of Brydens had already taken out the championship. We actually talked to Lee that morning on Sailing Chix. In second place was my oldest friend Nath Wilmot who we also talked to that morning. He was sailing on Hubble with the skiff legend Peter Hubble. Congratulations to both crews it is fantastic to see Lee and Nath still battling each other at the front of the Fleet! Another title from Lee as this one just slipped out of Nath’s reach. I am sure in the future he will get the chance to be the 16’s Champion.

The crew of Bryden’s had remarkable pace off the start line. They then ended up in the drink thanks to a broken shackle. The point of this story is massive. Even though they had won the series Lee was prepared as always and had a shackle in his life jacket. What do you carry? They were able to fix it and fight their way back through the fleet showing just how good they are.

It was great to catch up with so many of my old Flying 11 friends. I grew up sailing as a teenager at Manly 16′ Skiff Club and I am still a member there so many years later. This past season we at DeckHardware have supported the Fire Stopping team. All very old friends of mine who despite this put together the best sponsorship proposal I have seen in years! It wasn’t their regatta but it was great to see the three of them on the water together!

Link to the images I took on Facebook.

Check out the short video I took on the day!

December 24, 2012December 24, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

Boxing Day is almost here!

Yeah ok we have Christmas first. But Boxing Day is going to be just so exciting this year it is hard to not get excited. We at Sailing Chix with Nix will be doing a live coverage of the Rolex Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race start on Boxing Day. Once again my Dad will be the starter on the second line as well. So it is a big day for us!

Sailing Chix with Nix will be LIVE on Boxing Day covering the Start of the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race!

Sailing Chix

Sailing Chix with Nix will be live on location for the start of the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race based at Tania Park above Grotto Point on the Northern Beaches in Sydney! The Chix can’t wait to bring you five hours of interviews from yachts, specialists, weather gurus, the community and more to really bring the Hobart to life! We will kick off from 9AM and take you right through until 2PM as the boats leave the heads and start the journey South!

Want to know more about Sailing Chix with Nix head over to our website www.sailingchix.org

You can listen live via radio, streaming online or via the Tune In app – details below!

Radio: 88.7 or 90.3 in Sydney

Apps: Tune In

Tunein website

Have a very Merry Christmas everyone!

Bring on Boxing Day!

December 18, 2012December 18, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

Sail Sydney takes over

I am sitting here trying to figure out what to say. Massive. Huge. Epic. Is pretty much all I can come up with. I spent 4 days at Sail Sydney on the Start / Finish boat for Course area B and I am exhausted. We had all sorts of classes including: 470, 420, 49er and FX, Windsurfers, Access Classes, 2.4, 29er, Moths etc. At times finishing boats of such varying speeds was a little interesting. It was great to work with some other start teams to see how they do things.

It was great to see Tom Slingsby and Iain Jensen get out on their Moths and have some fun away from their Olympic Classes. Starting and finishing the Moths was certainly interesting. Although we did have some very light air on the last day which meant low ride starts for the Moths. Old School! Thanks to those who put some DeckHardware stickers on their boats.

Sail Sydney was a huge event with over 460 competitors. Amazing turnout!

Saturday was a pretty big effort. I did the Radio show in the morning then rushed to MHYC to jump on the start boat so Dad could take me around to get on the WSC start boat. I jumped into a RIB to transfer in between. Literally going from one side of the RIB to the other as it was easier than transferring between the bigger boats. Thanks to Dad for the delivery!

Sailing Chix with Nix is going amazingly well and appeared on the front page of Sailing Anarchy last week as a show to listen too. We are being received so well in the wider community and had the chance to talk to Mark Richards and Carl Crafoord on Saturday about their Hobart experiences. We are looking forward to Boxing Day and talking to them before the race start along with many others.

Listen to our live show this Boxing Day from 9am for the start of the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race!

You can listen live via radio, streaming online or via the Tune In app – details below!

Radio: 88.7 or 90.3 in Sydney

Stream: Northern Beaches Radio (streaming)

Apps: Tune In is one of the best ways for those to listen outside of Sydney!

You can also catch our past shows, or keep up to date on news during the week via our social media!

Past shows

October 3, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

Where is our club heading?

Where do you want to see our club in 5, 10 15 years time? I would like to see Middle Harbour Yacht Club as the destination for Sailors who love our sport and wish to compete against the highest level of sailors run by professional race committee that is the envy of other clubs. Our location is and we know that.

I believe we need to inspire the next generation to stay in sailing and hopefully at our club. So that they too then inspire the next generation to love our sport of Sailing.

My family was a part of the highly successful era in MHYC Centreboard and Offshore Sailing scenes. Lately MHYC has told the world how strong we were and the sailors our club produced through its fantastic Centreboard Division.

Centreboard Division

Create a family environment
Get parents involved
- Show them how to get involved
Run a power boat handling operators course
Look at classes offered and the direction of these classes offered at the club
- Have a pathway and options along the path for our sailors. When I was a teenager I asked and my mum fought to head down the same path as RPAYC, CYCA and RSYS and their training centres.

Junior Division

Optimist

Intermediate Division

This is currently where our club is placed. Ideally we should have an all inclusive Centreboard Division as it was when it was the strongest club in Sydney.

I would like to call on all those who believe in Middle Harbour Yacht Club to stand up and assist our club in finding its “Mojo”. Many of you may have young kids and be wondering what path to lead them. Whether they will be as lucky as you were growing up in a fantastic sailing environment.

I believe Middle Harbour Yacht Club has an opportunity right now as they did back then. Perhaps instead of telling the teenagers what they will sail next they could hold an open event for all dinghy classes. Then advise these classes that MHYC would love to have them race on a regular basis. The place to start would be the 505’s which were such a strong class once at MHYC. Let’s make the event a fantastic event and show everyone what a great place it is to sail and how amazing the people are. How much we all love the sport of sailing. We have the facilities to run the most professional event possible. We also have the personnel in not only staff but a fantastic volunteer base that have run many great regattas over the years.

There are many questions people have asked me over the years. Why was I the youngest skipper by such a margin? Why was I the only racing female skipper? Where did those you grew up with go? Where is your age group? Why did the Centreboard Division fold all those years ago? Why are there so few females? How did you manage to run so many women’s events and crews?

I have over the years said I have some but not all the answers should anyone wish to listen to someone so young. I am a little older now and would love to talk to those who want to listen to my thoughts. Perhaps we could hold an open forum and invite the members of the past?

So I ask: Where do you see Middle Harbour Yacht Club in 5, 10, 15 years time?

September 27, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

My week so far

I have just spent the last three days doing the instructors course at Middle Harbour Yacht Club. It was nice to finally tick that off the list as it is something I have been meaning to do for a long time but just not had the chance. Having already done the Powerboat Handling and First Aid this was the next thing on my list. Great to be able to say after over 20yrs I now can call myself an Instructor. The course was certainly beneficial especially for someone like me who does not remember learning how to sail. So trying to put myself in a learners shoes is not something I can easily relate to. So to have the guidelines to go by will certainly make it a whole lot easier for me to help out those new to our sport!

I must admit that yesterday I was pretty lucky to be on the water. Great blue sky and even better was the fact that it was a Nor’easter!

BRING ON SUMMER!!!

Now to pack the van for Belmont and the Yachting NSW Youth Championships, unpack a Liros Shipment this afternoon, go to the rules night at the club tonight for a refresh, pack myself for Belmont. Then head up to the youth states on Friday.

At this stage there are 196 competitors for the NSW Youth Champs. That is amazing! Dad is the RO for Course Area B and at this stage I am on the Pin boat. We have the Laser Radial, Laser 4.7, Flying 11, 420 and 29’er fleets!

29er 15

420 13

Bic Techno 293 3

Flying 11 43

Flying Ant 4

Laser 4.7 17

Laser Radial 20

Open BIC 8

Optimist 45

Optimist – Silver Fleet 5

Sabot 23

Bit on….

Check out the Youth Champs Website.

August 27, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

Thank you Huey!

Yesterday I spent the day on the MHYC start boat with a fantastic team including my Dad at the MHYC Sound Championships. The breeze however made it for one of my more interesting days on the water. Talk about shifts! We all know that Westerlies in Middle Habour make for interesting sailing and testing conditions. The shifts really are affected by the hill and can swing over 50 degrees on a regular basis. So setting course is difficult and really hurts the brain.

Then throw in the fact that half way through the day the breeze decided to do a 180 and come in from the EAST!!! Thankfully Dad finished the boats whilst I liaised with RIBS to arrange a new course so we could do it as fast as possible to get enough races in to have a series result. There was not much time to rest for the 5 of us on the start boat. Let alone get in some lunch!

With 5 short races and a fleet of Optimists and 420’s it was great to have a good team to work with on the start boat who knew what they were doing. There really were no breaks between the starts and finishes! Especially as the 420’s needed a couple of General Recalls.

Photos when I had the opportunity

to take them are here

I was very impressed with the majority of the fleet. It is fantastic to see so many young sailors thank the start team as they finished the last race. Some even thanking us in between races. There needs to be more of this to encourage more volunteers like us to spend their day on the water supporting our next generation of Aussie Sailors.
Right now I could not be more proud of Australian Sailing. Olympics, America’s Cup, Melges 24, Moths and much more are showing how good and how strong and varied Australian Talent is right now.

It is true. Aussie Sailors Rock!

August 22, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

A Sydney Harbour Lighthouse

Two fantastic images of a subject I know so well.

A Sydney Harbour Lighthouse.

February 22, 2012February 22, 2012 Melissa Yeomans

Sailing Photos that rock

Some days you just know there will be the chance for some awesome photos. Looks like yesterday in the 18’s was just one of those days. This photo of Thurlow Fisher Lawyers who won Race 3 of the Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour is just one of those shots that everyone is talking about.

Check out the other images

or read the story on MySailing

I was lucky a few years ago to spend a day on a headland filming the 12′ skiffs. It was one of those days that I could not decide between video and still images. The 12’s are another class which are known for getting just a little bit of air. They even have a miners trophy.

Melissa Yeomans

Sailing, it's a way of life.

sydney harbour