Smooth Sailing
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News By A Sailor For Sailors!
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The
event that the sailing world has been waiting for finally kicks off this
weekend when the 31st America’s Cup Match takes place. The defender,
Team New Zealand, is a relative unknown quantity with a radical boat and a
young crew. Few of the old hands from the last defence remain and the main protagonists from that campaign are now on
board the challenging yacht, Alinghi. Alinghi is a relatively conservative
boat, outwardly there is nothing unusual about her as there is with Team New
Zealand. She has proven herself to be fast in all conditions and came through
the Louis Vuitton Cup with an outstanding record. I, like many cannot wait to
see what happens when the two come off the start line on Saturday, which will be
faster, higher, tactically on top? It is just too hard to call up front. The
cup website is now up and running at www.americascup.yahoo.com.
Greenlight
KZN L26 Training Weekend
Peter
Goldman Photographic Presentation
Your Weekend Weather according to the South African
Weather Service is going to be as
follows:
Durban
& Richard’s Bay: Saturday will be 29
degrees, partly cloudy and humid with the cloud cover increasing later in the
day. The wind will be a moderate
northeasterly changing to a southwesterly later in the day. Sunday will be
warmer at 32 degrees with clear skies and high humidity. The wind will be a
moderate northeasterly.
Midmar: Saturday will be 28 degrees and sunny becoming partly
cloudy later in the day. The wind will be a light westerly becoming a southerly.
Sunday will be 30 degrees and sunny but becoming cloudy in the afternoon. The
wind will be a light north westerly.
Vaal
Dam: Saturday will be a hot day at 30
degrees becoming partly cloudy later with a 20% chance of afternoon
thunderstorms. The wind will be a light northwesterly. Sunday will be pretty
much the same with the chance of afternoon thunderstorms increased to 30%.
Cape
Town: Saturday will be partly cloudy with
a temperature of 25 degrees and a 20% chance of showers early the day. The wind
will be a fresh westerly. Sunday will be 26 degrees and cloudy with a 50%
chance of rain by evening. The wind will be a fresh northwesterly.
The first sailing activity to note this weekend, well it is not so much
activity as viewing, is the Road to the America’s
Cup which will be screened on ESPN this afternoon at 14:00. That’s just the
beginning though, on Saturday from 12:00 until 14:30 a replay of race one,
sailed in the early hours of Saturday morning SA time, will be screened. Then
on Sunday, in the early hours, 02:00 to be exact, the second race will be
screened live. All this on DSTV channel 33. I would advise that you verify
these times on the DSTV guide but the last time I checked this was how they
were advertised.
Saturday sees the second weekend of the PYC Class Champs taking place. Two
races are scheduled to be sailed on the deepwater course in Durban Bay.
The Greenlight KZN L26 Training Weekend takes place in Durban this weekend with
Dave Hudson and Rick Nankin imparting some of their extensive knowledge on the
KZN fleet. The session starts off with registration and a few drinks at the
RNYC this evening from 17:00 to 19:00. On Saturday morning there is a 09:00
start for a shore based presentation in the PYC Ward Room. From 11:30 until
14:30 it will be onto the water for some sailing practice. This session will be
videoed and the video replayed and analysed in a later de-brief session in the
PYC Ward Room. On Sunday it will be onto the water bright and early for a 10:00
start in the RNYC Albatross Series. Two races will be sailed and again the
video camera will be in operation. Once the two races are done everyone will
return to the PYC Ward Room for a further analysis and de-brief. It should all
be over by 14:30. Now if you don’t learn anything from all this, well, no
comment actually. Even if you are not sailing I would recommend that you get
yourself down to the off water sessions. I think that there should be a lot to
learn just from hearing what gets said. If you need any further information at
this stage please contact Chris Rudham on 082 572 3201.
On Saturday evening, as part of the Greenlight L26
Training Weekend, but of more general interest, Peter Goldman, the well-known Cape
Town based photographer, will be giving a Presentation of his Photographic Works. This will be a big screen digital display and will include pictures
taken at the 2002 Lipton Cup, 2002 Louis Vuitton Cup Regatta in Auckland and
the start of the 2003 Cape to Rio Race. Peter has taken some outstanding
pictures in his time, you have probably seen many of them on the cover of
Sailing Incorporating SA Yachting actually, including this months great cover
picture of the foredeck crew hard at work on Morning Glory. The presentation
will take place in the PYC Ward Room from 18:00 until 19:00 and is recommended
for all who have an interest in boats and boating. The presentation will be
followed by a braai on the lawns at RNYC. This is also well worth attending not
only for the outstanding venue but also for the general sociability and the
fact that there should be loads of good yachties there talking sailing and
other interesting things! Braai meat and salads will as always be available and
it goes without saying that the bar will be open.
On Sunday RNYC will be running the Albatross Series 1 offshore for
keelers. Now to accommodate the L26 training that will be taking place the
racing will start extra early, at 10:00 to be exact. This means an extra early
wake up on Sunday morning, though if you have been watching the America’s Cup
it will probably mean just getting off the couch and heading straight down to
the club. For the cruising fleet though
racing will start at the regular time of 11:00 so a little cat-nap after the
early morning tv will be in order.
Sunday is also the annual Hobie
Indaba Day takes place at the PYC Beach
Site at Vetch’s Pier. The aim of the day is to get as many cat and cat sailors
on the beach for the day. This creates
not only a great spectacle with so many brightly colored sails on the beach but
also a whole load of interest in the sport and gets some old sailors and boats
out of the woodwork. There must be hundreds of beach cats lying around in
people’s gardens, not only Hobies but also Halcats and Darts. Hopefully some of
those old sailors and boats will get into the swing of things and come back for
more throughout the rest of the season. During the day there will be some
informal handicap racing, beach games and prizes for the oldest boat on the
beach and more interestingly the oldest sailing t-shirt on the beach. While all
this is going on the bar will be open with cold beer and hot food on sale. All
in all it should be a great day. For
more information contact Lorraine Duggan-Jones on O82 664 8555 or Ed Page on 082 422 8464. So, if you have a beach
cat lying around, Hobie, Dart or anything else lying in your driveway or back
yard get it out and down to the beach.
This weeks Wednesday Evening Fun Race took place again in perfect summer
conditions. A light northeasterly, which faded a little towards the end, clear
skies and warm weather, what more can you want. The biggest racing fleet in
ages turned out on the start line with seven boats competing. Chris Frost’s
Fast 42 Prodigy made a welcome return to the fleet and promptly won again!
Meanwhile in the cruising fleet the revised handicaps seem to have shaken
things up again with a whole lot of new names at the front of the fleet. The
after party was loads if fun with great competition on for the Vaurnet
Sunglasses on offer. Isn’t it amazing what people will do for a freebie?? A
great time was had by all. The results from the evening’s race were as follows:
Racing Class
1st Prodigy Fast 42 Chris Frost
2nd Orion
Zephyr L26 Craig Millar
3rd Parental
Guidance L26 Rick Parker
Cruising Class
1st Resolve Beneteau
2nd Jambo
3rd Number 10 Fast 42 Bill Tyler
Geronimo continues to smoke while
Kingfisher is looking a little bit pedestrian at this stage in their respective
Jules Verne Trophy attempts. A whopping 521 miles in the
last 24 hours at an average speed of 21 knots gives you some idea of just how
fast Geronimo is going as they cross the bottom of the Pacific Ocean heading
for Cape Horn. Geronimo is currently way down south a 55 degrees of latitude
although the water temperature is still high enough that they are not worrying
too much about icebergs at this stage. After an extended period of frustrating
light winds the Kingfisher is finally finding the breeze and they are hoping
for a 500 mile plus 24 hour run today. At present though they are way off the
record pace, 30 hours behind the current record and 77 hours behind Geronimo.
There is a lot of hard work ahead now for the Kingfisher team as they head
south looking for the low pressure systems that they are homing will catapult
them around the southern end of the globe. For more information visit the
Kingfisher web site at www.teamkingfisher.com or the Geronimo web site at www.grandsrecords.com.
Our Notices of Race page on the Smooth Sailing has all the NOR’s available to us. If you
have a regatta coming up and would like to make the NOR available online then
e-mail it to hethcot@iafrica.com and it will be posted and
listed in this newsletter. To get your copy simply click on the name of the
regatta you are interested in below:
|
Regatta |
Venue |
Dates |
|
Various
WC Dinghy Clubs |
September
2002 to March 2003 |
|
|
Various
KZN Clubs |
December
2002 to July 2003 |
|
|
Club
Mykonos |
21 &
22 February |
|
|
Henley Midmar Yacht Club |
1 & 2 March |
|
|
Sterkfontein Dam |
1 & 2 March |
|
|
Glendee
Yacht Club |
15 &
16 March |
|
|
The
Sailing Center, Simon’sberg Navy Base, Simonstown |
20 to 22
March |
|
|
Henley
Midmar Yacht Club |
20 to 23
March |
|
|
Club
Mykonos |
21 to 23
March |
|
|
Milnerton
Aquatic Club |
21 &
22 March |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Saldahana
Bay |
18 to 21
April |
|
|
Inhaca
Island to Richard’s Bay |
18 April |
|
|
Henley
Midmar Yacht Club |
26 to 28
April |
|
|
Henley
Midmar Yacht Club |
3 May |
|
|
Zululand
Yacht Club |
14 to 16
June |
The Classifieds has been updated on the Smooth Sailing web site. Take a surf past to see what is for sale or sought after in the wanted column. To place an ad, e-mail the details to hethcot@iafrica.com.
10% Shares in
Prout Cat
5 Shares Available
Totaling 50% of yachts
value
Well Appointed cruiser
Lying in Durban
Contact: Rob Black
Cell: 082 640 8731
E-Mail: jbtrade@yebo.co.za
WANTED
Conact: Andrew
Heathcote
Cell: 083 783 8805
E-Mail: hethcot@iafrica.com
Andrew Heathcote
Mobile: +27 (0) 83 783 8805
This newsletter is
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that which may be of interest to yachtsmen.
Please note that the views
contained in this newsletter are those of the authors concerned and in no way reflect
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