Yachting News 15th October 2010

Oct 15, 2010 No Comments by skiff

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Greetings yachties,

In this issue:

The latest YouTubes to watch while I build another thread.

Zbigniew Gutkowski,

James Spithill – Aussie male sailor of the year,

RC44 Worlds – fleet racing,

Keep Turning Left,

SailingXperience – latest issue here,

Sail-World USA – latest issue here,

Sail-World Australia – latest issue here,

Sail-World New Zealand – latest issue here,

Enjoy

more images here

Zbigniew Gutkowski is one of Poland’s best known and most experienced sailors with a wealth of offshore and inshore racing. The 36-year-old first honed his talents as a member of the Polish national sailing team, representing his nation in the 470 dinghy class from 1987 to 1995. He also spent several years campaigning state of the art 49er dinghies and was one of the most successful crews in Poland.

In 2000 Zbigniew, known as ‘Gutek’, turned his hand to offshore sailing and that year he was Watch Captain onboard WARTA-POLPHARMA in The Race, the non-stop race around the world for multihulls. In 2005 he skippered the ORMA 60 Bonduelle in the Nokia Oops Cup. He also attempted to break the monohull record for a non-stop circumnavigation onboard the Volvo 60 Bank BPH (formerly ASSA ABLOY), but damage forced the crew to Cape Town after 9,500 miles.

Gutek hopes to be the first Polish sailor ever to race solo around the world. He has clocked up more than 100,000 nautical miles at sea and will be adding another 30,000 to his tally when he competes in the Eco 60 class in the 2010/11 VELUX 5 OCEANS.

more here

Coutts wins RC 44 fleet race Worlds at Puerto Calero – Spithill overall winner

Yacht 17 takes overall title after BMW ORACLE Racing wins feet racing

LANZAROTE, Canary Islands (16 October 2010) – Australian Jimmy Spithill, Anders Myralf of Denmark and the international crew of the yacht 17 concluded a banner week in the Canary Islands by winning the inaugural RC 44 World Championship for the Islas Canarias Puerto Calero Cup.

After three days of match racing at the outset of the week, the regatta wrapped up today with the conclusion of the fleet racing, which counted 10 races in total. The yacht 17 won the match racing and finished second in the fleet racing to claim the championship.

Spithill, Myralf and the 17 crew entered the day in the lead, but an early start in one race and penalties in the other two nearly scuttled their regatta.

“We’re feeling great,” said Spithill, 31, of Sydney, Australia. “It was a tough day on the water for us. We tried to stay clean but got tangled up a couple of times. It was really unpredictable on the water, but at the end of day we hung tough and got it done.”

Heading into the final heat of the fleet racing portion of the regatta the top three boats – No Way Back, BMW ORACLE Racing and 17 – were within 1 point of the title.

No Way Back and 17 each had to perform penalty turns in the race, which allowed BMW ORACLE Racing, led by tactician Russell Coutts and local helmsman Jose Juan Calero to claim the win.

“I’m very grateful to Russell Coutts and Mr. Ellison for giving me an opportunity to steer the boat,” said Calero, whose family hosted the regatta at the Puerto Calero Marina. “It means a lot for me because we organized the event as well. It was very stressful at times, but big fun at the end of each race.”

No Way Back, led by owner Pieter Heerema of The Netherlands and tactician Ray Davies of New Zealand, finished third in the fleet racing with 55 points. Coupled with their sixth-place finish in the match racing, they placed third overall.

“It was a great event. I love Lanzarote and Puerto Calero,” said Heerema, last year’s RC 44 season champion. “Being third makes me very happy. We’ve struggled a bit this season. We’ve just never sailed to our level. We were feeling we were sliding down, but to be a strong contender before the last race makes us feel good.”

Top honors on the final day of racing went to Chris Bake’s Team Aqua, with New Zealander Cameron Appleton calling tactics. Team Aqua posted the low score of 6 points on finishes of 1-1-4, a welcome day after two days of struggles.

“We redeemed ourselves a bit; finally figured out the racecourse and got our boat figured out,” said Bake, who swept all three titles at the previous RC 44 event in Valencia. “It was massively difficult out there with the shifts and the bias in the course. It felt good to be leading the pack again.”

With just the Miami RC 44 Cup remaining on the schedule, BMW ORACLE Racing leads the season standings with 8 points, followed by No Way Back with 10 points, 17 with 12 points, Artemis with 12 points and Team Aqua with 15 points.

The Miami RC 44 Cup is scheduled Dec. 7-12.

more here

HSBC Premier Coastal Classic Media Release

Micro racers can pack punch against big rivals

In 2009, three small boats astounded the sailing world when they finished the HSBC Premier Coastal Classic in astonishing times.

Overload – a hard chined 9.1m Elliott design owned by Scott Randall – finished in 10 hours and 53 minutes, wiping more than an hour of the under 9.14m (thirty foot) record, also beating the best time ever set for forty footers, and the Shaw 9ms, Karma Police and Deep Throttle, were just ten minutes behind.

The emerging fleet of ‘micros’ are circa-thirty footers that give exceptional performance in downwind and reaching conditions, thanks to clever utilization of the absolute latest design and construction developments, including canting keels, and composite materials. Three of these boats are from the drawing board of Auckland designer, Rob Shaw. Deep Throttle, and Rob Shaw’s own boat, Karma Police, share identical hull, rig and sails. Deep Throttle has a single centre canard, and Karma Police twin asymmetric dagger boards, providing a theoretical advantage to Karma Police in upwind conditions. Both can get up to boatspeeds in the mid twenty knot range, and can equal or better boats ten to twenty feet bigger than them.

Rob Shaw’s crew are all experienced sportsboat sailors, which places them in excellent stead for racing a light keeler that responds well to apparent wind style sailing, and Deep Throttle’s Justin Ferris is a Volvo Ocean Race trimmer and driver, and races with a highly esteemed crew including former World Champion dinghy sailor, Blair Tuke. This year they are joined by a brand new rival who is bigger, but may well not turn out to be better. Volvo Ocean Race winner and former Rolex World Sailor of the Year Mike Sanderson has teamed up to launch another Rob Shaw design, the flush decked 10m Orbit. The handicapper has rated the boat as being slower than its little sisters – and with its planned launch date just six days before the race start, the boat will be an unknown quantity right to the very end. All four boats will compete in Division 1, against mighty entrants including the Evolution Sails Limit, which is nearly twice their size, and the fifty footers Wired and Ran Tan II.

A yet smaller boat, designed with the same goal in mind, but competing in Division 2, is a 6.5m carbon fibre canting keeler, based on a Gary Lambert 12ft dinghy which its builder, Mark Beauchamp, blew up on a large photocopier. While the original version had wide wings and wires that he didn’t enjoy, he decided it could be improved by cutting the boat in half along the guts with a chainsaw, and extending the waterline length to 28 foot. “The result is a narrow water line with slightly flared sides a bit like a canoe under the water,” explains Mark Beauchamp. The lifting canting keel makes the boat trailerable, and is easily adjusted by an electric winch controlled with two buttons at foot level. “Tongue Twister was built with the idea of going fast for cheap and also I enjoy being the small boat in the fleet trying to beat the bigger more expensive machines,” says Beauchamp, who has a very experienced Northland crew aboard with him for this year’s Coastal Classic. Tongue Twister’s shakedown race saw her get up to a maximum speed of 16.7 knots before turning around to battle into a 20 knot headwind. “Our current handicap puts us in Division 2 with the big boys which will be a challenge to say the least but again I will enjoy being the little guy, though should the wind be forecast 20 knots on the nose she will go straight back on the trailer!” says Mark.

Rob Shaw is confident his boat can perform again in downwind conditions: “If we get conditions again similar to last year we can hang in there against the fastest 50′s as long as we don’t have to much of an upwind from the Brett into Russell. So anything from the south west round to the south east is good for us and with a good breeze it’s likely the record times from last year will be repeated or improved on.” “The new 10 metre Orbit will be a bit of an unknown quantity going into the race with none of us having had a chance to line up against them prior to the start.” Justin Ferris says, “this will all depend on the conditions, same as last year and we are in for a good ride, anything from the north and we quickly become small boat with a high Rating so the chances of a good result is not so likely. Where these boats are extremely fast is with the wind aft of 100 TWA, this seems to be the point at which they break free and really fly.”

Joining HSBC Premier, which is also sponsor of Division 1, are eight divisional sponsors, each contributing prizes to its line honours winners and handicap placegetters: Musto (Division 2), Safety at Sea (Division 3), Mt Gay Rum (Division 4), Steinlager (Division 5), Duke of Marlborough Hotel (Division 6), RAILBLAZA Ltd (Division 7), Jucy Rentals (Division 8), PredictWind.com (IRC), and SailNZ (Classic Division).

Snitch GPS will provide real-time GPS tracking of ten members of the race fleet, and Sunday Star Times and Trade-A-Boat Magazine are official media partners to the race. Predictwind.com will issue an official, detailed race forecast on the eve of the race.

The supermaxi Alfa Romeo broke a thirteen-year record drought when it set a new overall record last year, completing the race in 6 hours and 43 minutes, but Split Enz remains the fastest multihull to ever finish the race with a record set in 1996 of 7 hours and 20 minutes. The HSBC Premier Coastal Classic starts from 10am on Friday 22 October off Devonport Wharf in Auckland, and finishes off Russell Wharf in the Bay of Islands.