Winners
“The best in the world were here, and our wins in the Round Robin against current World Champion Ian Williams and Ed Baird (Alinghi helmsman) in the quarter finals gave us confidence. We started today without any pressure, as we had already reached our objective.
We are really happy and proud!”
MINOPRIO WINS MARSEILLE
In hard-fought 2-1 Final, young Kiwi team takes their first-ever Tour win
Marseille, France – After a long day that had it all – starting with long delays with no wind, then light and shifty conditions, and ending with a building breeze and waves – 24-year old Adam Minoprio (NZL) and his Emirates Team New Zealand/BlackMatch Racing team of David Swete, Tom Powrie, and Dan McLean have won the Marseille International Match Race, the first event of the 2009 World Match Racing Tour. After two years of trying, this is Minoprio’s first-ever victory on the Tour, for which he and his team earn 10000 € of the 50000 € purse and 25 points on the Tour leader board.
In true understated Kiwi style, Minoprio was modest in expressing his pleasure about the win, saying “We got two seconds last year, and to finally break the curse and earn a win here is great.”
Battle flags at the ready
Gold Cup 2008/09 last race 13 March
After the postponement of the last Gold Cup Race, The Balokovic, our motor out to the start of the Brin Wilson was a little flat. We had hoped for a blow, the forecast was for the breeze to die and swing East 15 dropping to 5knots, that means a few parkups.
The course had been set to Navy Buoy Tiri passage, then back to Rangitoto, turn left and head down to Motuihe, leaving Waiheke to Starboard, through Waiheke Channel and back to Orakei wharf leaving Browns Island to Port.
Off we go, kite up, gybe to miss the wind hole under North Head, easing down out of the tide at Rangi Light we manage to hang on the transom of Starlight Express, Boogiflash, Powerplay and Demonstrator sailed a higher angle, hoping for a bend in the breeze a bit later on – and they got it. Behind at Rangi light was Isis, Tour de Force, Pelagian (sailing 2 handed) and the rest of the fleet slowly dropping further back. Nice gentle kite ride along the East Coast Bays.
At the first mark Andar, an open 50 had managed to round just ahead of Starlight, Demonsator, Powerplay, BoogiFlash then us. Back hard on the wind all the way back to almost where we had come from in the last of the dieing breeze. Just as we approached Rangi Light the breeze softens, making pushing the tide a slow process. Once around crack sheets a little and set up the reaching Kite. By now the big boats had stretched out and were about to have an advantage of the last 2 hours of out going tide. A radio check on the now casting told us that the breeze was dieing fast.
Up with the reacher, get past these few bricks and peel the mast head. Flawless crew work is now the norm and all aboard are enjoying the sailing. The wind hole has brought us all back together again. Demonstartor is reaching over to Browns Island to take advantage of the tide flowing out of the Tamaki. Andar has gybed towards Issy Bay. Starlight is running as flat as she can, Boogiflash is also running deep. Power Play has made a big gain on the windward leg and is way ahead, running deep. We run at about 130 trying to keep our 11 tons moving as fast as we can. slowly we drift through Motuihe Channel. Looking back to town its hard to pick the boats behind with their nav lights blended by the light wash ashore.
Starlights deep running has cost her as we reach over the top. Andar has also found the no wind a bit slow and we pass by her too. Demonstartor, Power Play and BoogiFlash have drifted through the gap well and are now way ahead and 2 have gone out to sea. We gybe our way towards Waiheke trying to keep the kite fill and stay in as much of the last of the out going tide as we can. Slowly the breeze is starting to come back from the south with a little easting in it, off Onetangi the breeze is now at 160mag, we need to change our light sheets and set up of on the wind.
Andar has found some good pressure, reaching down to our line. By Ganet Rock we are 3rd boat on the water with Powerplay and Demonstrator ahead, Andar, BoogFlash, Starlight Express behind. Setting ourselves up a little off the coast we find a huge easterly knock while inshore Andar and Boogiflash are laying up the beach. Finally we get on the right side of the shift and get back into the southerly. Opting to take the 2nd entrance into Waiheke Channel, this movegives us a huge gain and sets us up high and fast. Unfortunity we are about to find the next big parking lot by Sunday Rock. Andar and Startlight are able to take advantage of their big headsails and code zeros leaving our IRC rated 105% crying in pain with a lack of any hosre power, we are gutted when Boogiflash sails up and around us. 0.0 boat speed and 0.0 on the GPS, we can only sit and watch those around us sail away. Finally a little puff as the sun breaks dawn. Up with the masthead and drift home. We are now bringing the new easterly down to the boats ahead. Day light lets us see how the night treated the other yachts and if we have made the gains we think we have.
Sure enough Demonsrator has sailed a great race to be miles ahead. Just short distance to leeward Powerplay is under kite by Motuihe. We are in the chasing group of 4, drifting west with 3 knots of building zepher. Just off rocky bay we see the smaller yachts have also had close racing as about 5 of them round the corner for home. A small shift back to the south allows us to reach home with a bit more speed, back to Headsail for the last few miles, Rum Bucket time.
almost finished
Story and Pictures by KnotMe
Well what a fantastic weekend of yachting, drinking and with a big does of Ya Hooing.
Friday start saw a 20 plus fleet leave the mouth of the Tamaki under kite. A few nice wipeouts at the 1st gybes to get around Browns by the cold crews. Then a shy – tight – too tight – very shy style kite ride done to Nth Harbour, Ponui with the wind fading away towrds the end. Transformer, Peppermint Planet and Extract Digit scrapping it out in Div 1. Knot that we were close enough to see but ED got the gun by milliseconds I’m told. In Div 2 Suburban Reptile was looking good until some sly slippery and obviously suspect Buoy Racer sneaked up the shoreline under the cover of darkness to get SR by 50mts on the line. BR is one quick Elliot in the lighter winds, bugger it. The SR Travelling Man pulled a good 3rd on line.
Saturday morning arrives and some crews weren’t looking that good at all. Apparently dodgy water in their tanks, gold coloured stuff packed in 40oz glass bottles. The skipper on one boat was heard to say ‘I’m only have one then going to bed’. His co-skipper stupidly though ‘one’ meant one glass but when morning arrived his throbing head realised it meant one bottle. Ouch…
Elliott keelboats match racing in Sydney
Where next for Women’s Olympic Match Racing?
Download Print Send a summary of this page to someone via email.
Previous |
12 March 2009
This season marks the first year of the new Olympic discipline, Women’s Match Racing. The replacement event for the Yngling fleet racing, supporters of match racing said it would attract more women into Olympic competition. After winning a close vote against a women’s high performance dinghy in November 2007, the next task was to work out a format for the new Olympic discipline.
A year later, at the ISAF Conference in November 2008, scant progress had been made and there was little clarity as to how Women’s Match Racing would be implemented. However, it was decided that the Elliott 6 Metre keelboat would become the equipment of choice and that sailors would bring their own boats to competition.
Bacardi Cup 2009
Bacardi Cup – Race 6
Paul Cayard
Friday, March 13, 2009
Photo © Alex Gort/Bacardi Cup
Another perfect day, 78 degrees, 10 knots of wind from the southeast. We did have a big cloud come over the course today and kill the wind for a while on the second windward leg but, I don’t think it shuffled the results too much.
We were convinced about the right side of the course today so we started up by the right handside of the line and tacked shortly after the start. That was wrong. We were deep all day! At this moment I am not even sure where we finished but it may have been 30th. It doesn’t really matter because thankfully all those “mediocre” finishes we had all week look pretty good right now as we will count an 11th and can discard today’s finish.
Peter Bromby and Magnus Liljedahl won the race and the Bacardi Cup. They sailed really well all week. Mark Medleblatt/Bruno Prada also sailed well today and finished second overall. John VanderMollen who had been second most of the week had an even worse race than us today, so we may have passed him. The Irish were over early at the start. They were just to windward of us so we were a bit lucky there but again, it wouldn’t have mattered. Rick Merriman and Phil Trinter (USA) sailed a solid second half of the series to finish 3rd with Flavio Marazzi (SUI) just one point behind them in 4th. I think we were 5th but I have not seen the scores. If so, I am pretty happy with that considering my rust.
It was a lot of fun sailing the Star again and sailing with Austin. I think it is doing me some good too. Even though today was our worst score I feel so much more comfortable in the boat than I did a week ago.
We will race again in two weeks in Mississippi for the Western Hemisphere Championship.
Tomorrow Austin and I will drive the boat and truck to Gulfport, Mississippi.
Top 10 Boats
| Place |
Skipper
|
Crew
|
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
Total
|
| 1 |
Bromby Peter
|
Liljedahl Magnus
|
6.0 [AVG] | 2.0 | 2.0 | 1.0 | 24.0 | 1.0 |
12
|
| 2 |
Mendelblatt Mark
|
PRADA BRUNO
|
3.0 | 23.0 | 1.0 | 10.0 | 3.0 | 2.0 |
19
|
| 3 |
Merriman Rick
|
Sharp Brian
|
6.0 | 44.0 | 7.0 | 6.0 | 12.0 | 8.0 |
39
|
| 4 |
Marazzi Flavio
|
Pedersen Petter
|
65.0 [OCS] | 12.0 | 13.0 | 3.0 | 5.0 | 7.0 |
40
|
| 5 |
Cayard Paul
|
Sperry Austin
|
11.0 | 10.0 | 8.0 | 5.0 | 11.0 | 24.0 |
45
|
| 6 |
Vandermolen Jon
|
Ewenson Geoff
|
2.0 | 16.0 | 6.0 | 2.0 | 20.0 | 30.0 |
46
|
| 7 |
Wright Peter
|
Quist Nathan
|
13.0 | 3.0 | 19.0 | 13.0 | 13.0 | 10.0 |
52
|
| 8 |
Macdonald Andy
|
Fatih Brian
|
65.0 [DNF] | 13.0 | 3.0 | 11.0 | 8.0 | 18.0 |
53
|
| 9 |
Pickel Marc
|
Mitchell Steve
|
5.0 | 26.0 | 45.0 | 8.0 | 2.0 | 14.0 |
55
|
| 10 |
O’Leary Peter
|
Goodbody Tim
|
4.0 | 29.0 | 17.0 | 4.0 | 4.0 | 65.0 [OCS] |
58
|
Upwind struggle as the fleet head south
For the Portimão Global Ocean Race fleet, freedom from the restriction of the ice gate at 45°S has been stalled by a low pressure system north of the boats, centred 1,200 miles off the coast of Chile. For the past two weeks, the seven offshore sailors have watched depressions spin eastwards beneath the mandatory, Pacific Ocean exclusion zone and now, having passed the eastern end of the boundary yesterday (13/03), the fleet are dealing with a rogue low pressure system tracking down onto the fleet from the north.
The direct result has been headwinds with the double-handed fleet’s speed averages dropping to five knots and below on Friday afternoon while solo sailor, Michel Kleinjans, held a northern heading longest on Open 40, Roaring Forty, polling the highest speeds at seven knots. In third place on the British Class 40, Team Mowgli, Jeremy Salvesen explained the situation late yesterday: “There is some irony and not a little frustration that having been forced to stay north of the ice gate at 45° for the last 2,500 miles, now that we have passed the eastern end of it, we are struggling to make any headway southwards at all!” In the latest, 0620 GMT position poll this morning (14/03), Salvesen and co-skipper, David Thomson, are trailing the double-handed leader by 130 miles, averaging just under eight knots, but progress south will improve as the breeze shifts from east to north-east later today, freeing the boats slightly. “This will all change within the next 24 hours as a new, small, but fast moving low pressure system overtakes us from the north,” confirms Salvesen. “This is going to bring strong headwinds and pretty confused seas for a couple of days with perhaps 30 – 40 knots of wind again. After that, however, it looks as if we should have reasonably favourable winds all the way down to Cape Horn, a little under 1,400 miles to our south.”
Despite the impressive, 94 mile lead built by Desafio Cabo de Hornos, Felipe Cubillos knows that things can change very rapidly. “What happens is that all the boats are in a zone of transition that will be determined in the next few hours when the wind rolls round to the east,” he wrote yesterday (13/03). “The English and the Germans were hit by the calm patch before us, but it is going to catch us soon. And as they entered the zone before us, they will also exit it before us and the tables will be turned.” However, the Chilean team continue to poll the highest speeds and Cubillos and his co-skipper, José Muñoz, are currently averaging a fraction under 11 knots, three knots faster than Boris Herrmann and Felix Oehme in second place on Beluga Racer and the British duo on Team Mowgli.
and here
and crew link here
$10 per week,
put your logo here.
20 logos for $10. includes a live link back to your webpage or contact e-mail
ERICSSON 3 Leg Five Day 29 QFB: received 14.03.09 0831 GMT
There is a big low pressure coming in and we are now in what we probably can consider as the calm before the storm. Today has been a beautiful day with around ten degrees in both air and water, and between five to ten knots of breeze. It was not really what I expected from this part of the world, but I guess we have not seen it all yet.
In a day or so we, for the second time on this leg, will aim straight into a big low pressure with up to 50 knots of wind. We will try to stay very close to the middle, in the 30-knot area. If you get too close to the middle you get stuck in no wind and big waves that come from all directions. And if you go too far north you will get hit by a lot more wind than you need.
Unfortunately, it seems like the boats behind us will get a more favourable path into and through the low, and it can be really tight around the Cape Horn.
Right now we are going really slow and Aksel (Aksel Magdahl/NOR) anticipated a couple of hours ago that we may loose 100 miles of our 150 mile lead in the next coming 12 hours.
In this moment, one option is to go close to the coast of Chile before rounding the Horn. Aksel says it’s a tricky area weather wise, Magnus (Magnus Olsson/SWE) agrees, but is even so excited, “That is probably the worlds most beautiful coast line. Really one of the nicest places on earth. But I guess we don’t have energy to even reflect on it when we get there.”
Magnus has a lot of memories about Cape Horn rounding’s. Today in the sunshine on deck we got to hear about one of them. It was when he was sailing to the South Pole with an explorer boat. “We had a really nice, clear and almost warm day when we came back to the Horn. It was 13 degrees in the water and no wind. One of the guys suggested that we should go for a swim. Of course we all agreed”… I guess there are not many who have been swimming in the Southern Ocean looking at Cape Horn.
On deck today we concluded that this is the biggest no-mans-land in the world. There is nothing out here. We have been sailing for days and days and days and there is nothing, just some albatrosses and other birds. Today we saw a small whale; It looked like a dolphin sized killer whale.
“I guess the big whales are really happy to live here though”, said Anders (Anders Dahlsjö/SWE). “There are not many people with the energy to travel here to try and hunt them”.
When it is calm like today, everyone tries to have a look around on the boat and see if something needs to be fixed. I for example had a look through the food to find out exactly what and how much of everything we have got left. This leg seems to be a never ending story and maybe we will need to ration some food in the end. But we will wait with that for as long as possible. It is now when it’s cold that we need the food the most. “I have stopped thinking so much about the finish line and what time we will get there. I am just working hard every watch, and we will see what happens”, Anders Dahlsjö said.
Gustav Morin – media crew member
Very busy this month, lots of yachting and its only Thursday, and then I get this black hole??
This composite image of the Medusa galaxy (also known as NGC 4194) shows X-ray data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory in blue and optical light from the Hubble Space Telescope in orange. Located above the center of the galaxy and seen in the optical data, the “hair” of the Medusa — made of snakes in the Greek myth — is a tidal tail formed by a collision between galaxies. The bright X-ray source found towards the left side of Medusa’s hair is a black hole.
Most bright X-ray sources in galaxies are binaries containing either stellar mass black holes or neutron stars that remain after the supernova explosion of a massive star. Because these compact objects can generate X-rays for much longer periods of time than the lifetime of their massive progenitor stars, X-ray binaries may be used as “fossils” to study the star formation history of their host galaxies. In this Medusa image, the X-ray binaries are seen as the bright blue point-like objects.
high res shots here
ERICSSON 3 LEG FIVE DAY 27 QFB: received 12.03.09 1049 GMT
Pressure on
This is a tough leg, for sure. It is so complex. All aspects of yacht racing plays a big part and if one doesn’t flow, it drags other parts down with it. It’s about endurance, both physically and psychologically, about routines with food, sleep and hygiene and above all it’s about the knowledge of sailing. How much you can push your crew and the boat. Also of course, skills in strategy, weather and navigation plays a huge part.
We have been doing well so far and are very happy to be where we are. At first we were not sure if we would manage to get to the start, but we put all the effort we could in making the boat ready to go, we sailed it shorthanded to China and started seven hours after the signal. And now, here we are working our guts out not to lose the lead we have been working so hard to get.
Our navigator’s choice to go north and catch on to a low pressure after the first scoring-gate paid off and today we passed the ice-gate a couple of hours before the second and third boat. Unfortunately being first to this gate doesn’t give us any points and from here to the scoring-gate at Cape Horn it seems to be a bit of a restart.
We wished we would be able to hang on to the low a bit longer and catch a weather system the others would not be able to reach. Being in another system is probably the only way to get a secure lead, if you are in the same system you can quickly loose a couple of hundred miles. Depressing for the one in the lead but fun and exciting for the ones following the race and a hint of hope for the ones trying to make gains from the back of the fleet. Unfortunately we dropped out of the low and lost a lot of pace so the others have been able to make depressingly big gains on us.
Today we have been in what every sailor would call a “shit fight”. We have constantly been sailing in less breeze than the others and right after the ice-gate we stopped completely for a while. Loosing up to 50 miles in one sched is not fun.
Here is when the psyche kicks in. We are all pretty bruised, battered and tired after 26 days of racing, 29 days if you count from Taiwan. We also have some flu going on, which can really bring the performance down. The more tired you get, the easier it is to make mistakes and the more mistakes you make the more you lose and the mood onboard gets bad.
So far we are doing good. We are hanging on to the “E3-spirit” and get up after each punch. But as the days get colder and our opponents get closer, everything will get harder.
This leg is a tough one, for sure.
Gustav Morin – mcm
TELEFÓNICA BLUE
LEG FIVE DAY 27 QFB: received 12.03.09 0504 GMT
We have had torrential rain the entire day, and not much breeze. High pressure systems bring back home clear blue skies, but here it seems always the opposite.
Right now the breeze is dropping further, only seven knots of breeze left, painful and raining even harder. The guys on deck look like soaked cats, and since the wind is stable in direction, one of the watch members can sit down below in the entrance of the cabin and at least stay dry for a bit.
I think this is one of the first watches that more than one on deck is feeling a bit colder. Still 700 miles to go to the second ice waypoint and with these speeds at least another three days to go. From there on it looks like healthy pressure going to the Horn.
We passed this morning a big group of pilot whales, who didn’t show any interest in us, but for us it was good to see something else, than just the grey skies.
We had today a day were we followed our media man in the galley and on deck. But when we reviewed the video, we all burst out in laughing. The most important shot was taken in the kitchen and faced aft. But in the corner of the picture a big white butt was to be seen. David was giving his buttocks a treatment with sudacreme, and of course didn’t know that he was in the shot. The stand in camera man didn’t realise he had David’s bum in the shot either. Of course it will be unusable for usage on the weekly TV programme, but it gave us a good laugh. Good that Gabry (Gabry Olivo MCM) can take on his normal duties again.
We gave our fuel situation a good look and it seems alright, even that we most likely spend more days on the water than ever expected. Food shouldn’t be an issue either and we have enough gas to keep cooking warm meals and prepare hot drinks.
As I type, breeze has dropped to a mere four knots, boatspeed 3.5 knots, did we deserve this? I guess so.
Bouwe Bekking – skipper
Where are they now? go here
Wednesday night racing on Auckland harbour, 30knots gusting 40. yeeha
The Chilean team extend their lead
The past 24 hours have been critical for the Portimão Global Ocean Race fleet as the eastern end of the 45°S ice gate approaches and the strategic options for the 1,500 mile dive south-east to Cape Horn at 56°S begin to open up the game. In the 0620 GMT position poll today (12/03), the double-handed division are spread over 83 miles with the Chilean team of Felipe Cubillos and José Muñoz on Desafio Cabo de Hornos increasing their lead over Boris Herrmann and Felix Oehme on Beluga Racer in second place to 36 miles with the British duo of Jeremy Salvesen and David Thomson battling equipment issues on Team Mowgli 47 miles behind the blue German Class 40. Meanwhile, 59 miles behind Salvesen and Thomson, solo sailor Michel Kleinjans on Roaring Forty continues to deliver consummate single-handing racing, judging the conditions and his boat perfectly.
Since yesterday morning, Desafio Cabo de Hornos have increased their lead over the German team on Beluga Racer by 23 miles. In many round the world races, this size of gain would be commonplace, but in the tightly-packed and evenly-matched Portimão Global Ocean Race, this 24 hour deficit is increasingly rare. Felipe Cubillos explained the cause late last night: “With the ice gate’s eastern end 150 miles south–east of us, the tactics were vital,” he says. “All our weather information indicated that the westerly breeze was going to shift to the south, so being to windward of the Germans when the shift came was a basic strategy,” Cubillos explains. However, weather models gave conflicting times for the shift and – at the crucial moment – the masthead instruments on Desafio Cabo de Hornos failed: “Unbelievable,” says the Chilean skipper, “and although we could use the second, backup instrument wand, the calibration is not that accurate.”
As stress levels rose, Cubillos chained himself to the nav station: “I admit that I spent two hours glued to the computer screen to judge the right moment to gybe.” Eventually, shortly after 1900 GMT yesterday, the Chileans made their manoeuvre. “There wasn’t much breeze at the time and we also experienced a really confused, sloppy swell left over from the storms over the past few days,” reports Cubillos. “In these conditions the autopilot really can’t cope and we’ve been handsteering constantly.” Currently in 17-20 knot south-westerly breeze, Cubillos and Muñoz are averaging just under 12 knots – two knots faster than the German team – in the sprint to the ice gate waypoint.
Too windy to match race today
Jolly Boat Nationals 14/15 March
Titirangi’s French Bay Yacht Club will play host to around 20 entrants competing in the Jolly Boat National Championships this weekend. Reigning Champs are Gordon Dyer in the single handed class, and Paul and Harry MacIntosh in the double handed class. www.jollyboat.co.nz
Pics from the Auckland Champs here sailed in February at Oneroa, Waiheke Island
Solar Mike
11 03 09
After yet another practically windless night the wind picked up to a healthy 15knots early this morning, bringing a smile to my face – some downwind conditions at last!
Last night I went to pump the ballast over from the middle to aft tank and after about 10seconds there was an ear-piercing shriek from the pump. After having a look I couldn’t see anything out of place, so decided to leave further investigation until this morning, as it had gotten dark.
I took the pump off the main engine and it’s mountings and after a good inspection I was pleased to see that the clutch had come loose, which is quite simple to put right. With a bit of tinkering here and there and some wedges to help me tighten it up I had it mounted and back working in no time. Job well done, I thought, and had a good portion of porridge with sultanas to celebrate.
It’s been a little warmer today, a welcome change! One thing I’ve noticed about being down here is just how effective my solar panels have become. There’s two mounted either side of the Fleet 77 and this afternoon they were putting out a good 6-7amps. They’re working better in these cold climates than they were in the tropics, much to my surprise. I always try and conserve power when I can and also run the really power hungry things like my water maker only when the generator is on.
Currently I’m on port gybe and are heading off to my waypoint just north of the Crozet islands. I’ve given them a fair bit of space as there is quite a large area of shallows surrounding them – meaning rough seas.
I’ve sent a photo through of yesterday evening where I was joined by a whole lot of albatrosses and other such birds. Hope you like it!
This post is tagged adam, bacardi cup, balokovic, barid, bekking, blackmatch, bouwe, brainaid, cayard, ed, ericsson, fortune, gilles, ian, jollyboats, marseille, martin-raget, match race, medusa galaxy, mike, minoprio, outrageous, paul, perham, portimao, telefonica, williams
No Comments
Leave a Reply