2015 North Shore  Freshwater Champs

• Full Results
• Photos care of John Adair

A 30 knot forecast plus a number of sailors over in Brisbane for the South Pacific Masters resulted in a slightly smaller than usual entry for the NSFWC at Pupuke on 16/17 May. However quality was there with 2 of our Open Worlds squad, defending NSFWC champion Andrew McKenzie and world top 10 ranked Mike Bullot fronting to give the locals something to aspire to in the Standards and World GM champion Mike Keeton and World cube winner Richard Blakey the form sailors in the Radial for the youth sailors to knock over. 

In spite of the forecast Saturday dawned with a nice Pupuke SW breeze, never really getting much over 12 knots but with shifts and pressure variations providing ample challenges for all. Sunday was again a SW breeze but lighter, around 5 to 8 knots all day. These conditions provided plenty of opportunity for all and no place was ever secure with some major shifts and gusts reshuffling both fleets in several races. 

As usual though the cream rose to the top. In the Standard fleet Mike showed his class with 5 wins from the 6 races, the sequence broken by Andrew who was deservedly victorious in race 3 and was right on Mikes heels in the other races, with the exception of the last where a major wind shift combined with a mainsheet that decided to come unkotted at a critical moment seeing him join the mortals in the bunch. There was a tight contest in the Masters, with GM Peter Kempkers victorious by 1 point from GM Nick Page after a very close series. Leading Master was Dean Drummond, who was still hoping for the forecast 30 knots even at the prize giving, in 5th, first Apprentice Rob Bland in 8th and GGM Ray Beale capping a consistent series with a 4th in the last race for 10th overall.

In the Radials Youth beat experience with Tim Adair putting together a great series to take out the overall win from newcomer and current Starling champion youth Josh Armit, who’s speed and consistency showed he will be a force to be reckoned with in the future. Third overall and first Master was Mike Keeton, who despite an ever increasing list of old age ailments seems to just keep pulling out the results on the water. He was followed by GM Kevin Welsh who managed a win in race 2 and was consistent all weekend. First women was Youth Libby Porter in 6th, who also showed flashes of brilliance in the challenging conditions with her best result a 2nd in race 2. 1st Master was Richard Blakey, who after a very challenging weekend was heard to comment on his love of the lake, while leading Women’s Master Georgina Wooldridge was happy to be on the water while husband Neil looked after the kids for the weekend rather than being able to demonstrate his prowess in the Standard fleet.

The contest was followed by the usual Pupuke prize giving, with an awesome range of prizes overshadowed only by commodore John Dowsett’s presentation skills (not matched this weekend by sailing skills we note). A great weekend and thanks to Pupuke and PRO Garth Briden for yet another quality regatta.

Nick Page

The 2^nd edition of the Auckland Women Laser Cup held at French Bay Yacht Club was a huge success. Eleven women sailors from French Bay, Kohimarama, Panmure, Point Chevalier, Pupuke and even as far as Worser Bay came to participate in this great event. A glorious autumn sun glistened on the Manukau harbour setting the stage for a great regatta with winds ranging from 5 to 15 knots and some racing tidal currents towards the end challenging all sailors.

There was some very close racing in the A fleet for 1^st place between Libby Porter from Kohimarama and Megan Thomson from French Bay. Libby finally won the day by winning the last race and coming back for the second time in a row with the impressive Auckland Women Laser Cup donated by Jim Quinn. Megan came a very close second and Georgina Wooldridge from Pupuke came third and first Master Women. First Junior was Aleisha Ferguson from Panmure.

The B division was won by Annika Greve from Worser Bay, second place and first Master went to Annie Mills from Panmure and third place to Ngaio Balfour from French Bay. This was a fantastic effort for this group as this was for many their very first regatta.

A special thanks needs to go to French Bay Yacht Club for hosting a great regatta, we all enjoyed the friendly welcome, the help with the trailors, the yummy baking and a good burger after a day racing and some great prizes.

Next year the regatta will be hosted at Point Chevalier Yacht Club, so if you missed this one make sure you are all there!

• All Results
• More Photo's

Cheers
Chantal Grass

Full Rig:
1st Rob Woodward (and 1st Masters)
2nd Owen Anderson
3rd Rodney Studd

Radial
1st  Edmund Tam (and 1st Masters)
2nd Olivia Christie (1st Youth and 1st Female)
3rd Bruce Jones

The Laser Champs were held as part of the Evans Bay Regatta.

Full Results for the Evans Bay Regatta

The 2015 Auckland Masters Championships, held at Tamaki on Saturday 21st March, attracted almost 40 entries with 25 Standards and a good group of Radials. 5 races were completed for both fleets in tricky E to NE breezes between about 5 and 12 knots. Seas were typically lumpy Tamaki sea breeze conditions with the heavy harbour traffic adding to the wind against an outgoing king tide for 4 of the 5 races.

In the Radial there was a very tight contest with current World GM champion Mike Keeton eventually prevailing by one point with a 1,1,1,2,3 scoreline over Richard Blakey, who made the podium in Hyeres in the Masters division, with a 1,1,2,2,3 scoreline. Third was Whangarei visitor Roger Winton who managed to get between Mike and Richard a couple of times and was unlucky not to pull off a win in one race. Shaaron Mckee was the leading Women’s Masters Radial sailor.

In the Standards reigning National Masters champion AM Kris Decke from Whangarei ended up winning convincingly with 4 bullets after starting slowly, having got caught on the wrong side of the beat in the first race. Second was expat Kiwi GM Gavin Dagley, now resident in Melbourne, who managed to show consistent form in all 5 races to convincingly win the GM division from third placed Nick Page (Pupuke), who was fortunate to be able to discard a meltdown in the 4th race. Leading Master was local Tamaki sailor Nick Brewer, back in the Laser after focussing on sailing the Mistral with his kids in recent times. Leading GGM was Bob Blakey, who showed he is still a force to be reckoned with a 2nd in one race in spite of turning 70 in the next few days. It was great to see 5 GGM’s in the Standard fleet, with Bob, Sandy Grigg, Jack Hansen, Dave Almond and Derek Bond all mixing it up during the day.

Nick Page

Results

• Standard
• Radial

Panmure Lagoon Sailing Club has had yet another successful Regatta that saw 39 Laser sailors & their steeds from all over the World – Canada, Austria, Switzerland–as well as the North Island, Taipa, Onerahi, Hamilton and Lake Ngaroto come & do battle on this challenging spot of water in Auckland. The winds defied all predictions coming in at 8 t0 11 knots from the South West giving our illustrious race officer Garth Briden something to work with. He managed to fire off 4 races even though those errant jockeys pushed their valiant steeds across the line three times in false starts. Garth got the measure of those miscreants by black flagging the starts which brought those fiery steeds back under control. The fleets were very tight with even the top end being continuously hounded by the hoards doggedly nibbling away at their heels.

The day closed with a BBQ & lamb on the spit followed by Prize giving with Daniel Barry from Canada taking out the RSA trophy & some other great goodies, which included a top section, 2nd place went to Andrew Childs from Taipa with our own Paul Page taking out 3rd. The Radial fleet was taken out by Loïc Eisenring of PLSC with 2nd place going to Kailash Clearwater of Taipa & Kevin Welsh PLSC taking 3rd place. Jana Senn from Nautic Club Austria won the First Women trophy. This was followed by spot prizes. We have to thank to our invaluable army of helpers who kept the whole day running like clockwork and our Sponsors who donated an impressive list of prizes.

So we thank our generous Regatta sponsors: RSA, Waipuna Hotel and Conference Centre, CRC, PredictWind, Auckland Seaplanes, the Water Shed, Survitec Group, Auckland Marine Centre, Red Carpet Tours, Boating NZ, Sugarcraft, Joy Adams Sails, Flyajet, Mortgage Express, YMCA and New Zealand Maritime Museum.

Results  http://www.plsc.org.nz/raceresults_files/RSARegatta2015.htm

Photos  https://www.flickr.com/photos/plsc/sets/72157648641055393/

A generally light regatta. Both days started with an Easterly before swinging to the North. And a solid breeze for the end of the second day.

Garth did well getting us all 6 races.

The racing was fair and the good guys still won.

This year the Chinese team dominated the Standard fleet finishing in the top 3 places with J. Zhou the champion. They have been training in Auckland and taking part in the NZ Laser Champs, Auckland Laser Champs and Sail Auckland.

 The Radial fleet was closely fought. Tim Adair was the eventual winner after only winning 1 of the 6 races, and only 3 points separated the top 3.

• Standard Results
• Radial Results

In the Open division overnight leader Andy Maloney was victorious overall, recording his first race win of the series in the first race today followed by a 2nd in the final race to win by three points from fellow NZL squad members Tom Saunders in second, Sam Meech in third and Mike Bullot in fourth. Maloney won out overall through consistency, with his worst counter a 3rd even though he only scored a single race win. By contrast all his NZL team mates won more races but were less consistent overall. Leading visitor was China’s Jianan Wu in 5th who was followed by Under 21 winner Andrew McKenzie in 6th.

In the Masters Radial Scott Leith maintained his perfect record to secure another overall Radial Masters title from two other AM’s, Ed Tam in second after a 2/2 result today and Tony Evans in third. Leading Master was Richard Blakey in 4th and leading GM Kevin Jenkins from Onerahi in 5th who will be exceptionally pleased to have bettered current GM Radial World champion Mike Keeton, who had a challenging day to end up 9th overall. Jim Quinn took the GGM honours from Greg Fry.

In the Masters Standards Kris Decke convincingly secured the title again with victory in the first race of the day. He was followed by leading GM Peter Kempkers in second who had an excellent series to lead first Master Mark Patterson who was third overall. They were followed by Pupuke's AM Rob Bland in 4th and GM Nick Page in 5th. Chris Sadler won the day with a 2/4 record to end up second Master and 8th overall.

In the 4.7 Phillip Governale was again victorious to secure the title from Emiri Koya.

• Full Results
• Photos

Nick Page

Barfoot and Thompson 2015 New Zealand Laser National Championships

Takapuna Boating Club

Updated 20 Jan 2015

All fleets again completed their scheduled races on the penultimate day of of the Barfoot & Thompson NZ Laser Championships at Takapuna. The sea breeze filled in earlier than on the previous two days, with a good 10 to 15 knot NE by the midday start time and pretty choppy conditions. This breeze held for the first race for all divisions but it started to ease for the second race and just held for the third before a SW change came in just as the last division finished. The course was set directly off Takapuna Beach, unlike the previous two days when we sailed further to the North. This meant that the there was a strong tidal flow across the whole course, resulting in long challenging beats against the tide.

In the Open division it was Mike Bullot’s day with three wins out of three. However both Andy Maloney (3/2/3) and Tom Saunders (5/3/2) had consistent days to hold first and second overall while overnight leader Sam Meech had, in his own words, “a shocker” with a 6/UFD/4 to drop him to third overall with Bullot rising to 4th. All members of the NZ Olympic squad these four are well ahead of the rest of the fleet overall and are separated by only 7 points going into tomorrow’s final two races, leaving them all with a chance at the title and the opportunity to strengthen their claim to the NZ Olympic slot. Other notable performances in the Open fleet today were Andrew McKenzie, who has all but assured himself of the under 21 title with a strong 7/6/5 today and Jinfu Zhao from China who’s 5/4/4 today gives him the potential for a top 5 overall finish and overhauling countryman Jianan Wu who is currently 5th.

In the Radial the honours for the day were shared between leading youth George Gauntry (2/3/2) and our 2012 female Olympic rep and defending champion Sara Winther (5/1/1). This leave George with a handy 6 point lead going into the final day with Sara 3rd overall and trailing our other female Olympic aspirant, Susannah Pyatt, by 5 points. Also making strong moves up the rankings today were Radial Open leader George Lane (1/4/5) who is up to 5th overall and Christchurch Youth Female sailor Ali Nightingale who’s 3/10/7 today has seen her close to within a few points of current YF leader Jia Kim from Korea who had a difficult day.

In the Masters AM Scott Leith continued his dominance in the Radial, and with a first as a discard seems unlikely to be challenged for the title. Leading Master Richard Blakey, a cube winner at this years Masters Worlds in Hyeres, enjoyed todays conditions and his 6/2/2 record moves him up to 4th overall just behind consistent AM’s Tony Evans and Ed Tam. Leading GM Kevin Welsh is 5th overall and while he found the going a bit tougher today he still holds a handy 4 point lead over reigning GM Radial World Champion Mike Keeton. Leading GGM is Jim Quinn from French Bay. In the full rig reigning champion AM Kris Decke has a good lead overall and was again consistent with a 1/2 day, matched by second placed overall GM Peter Kempkers. Unfortunate sailor of the day was Andrew Dellabarca, who was required to retire from the second race when leading as he collected a second yellow flag for the regatta. Leading Master is Mark Patterson in 4th overall.

Philip Governale again dominated the small 4.7 fleet with 3 wins to hold an unassailable lead while Joe Gauld also had a great day with three 2nd placings.

Tomorrows forecast has a light SW in the morning with a sea breeze in the afternoon. With the same first race start of noon for the last day there may be some challenges for PRO Ian Clouston to get the final two races for all fleets completed before the 3.30 deadline depending on how early the sea breeze arrives.

Nick Page

Correction: An earlier version of this report stated an earlier start time for the final day. That was not correct, the start time on Sunday is noon as per the original schedule.

Day 2 of the Barfoot and Thompson NZ Laser Nationals provided beautiful sailing, with the sea breeze slowly building throughout the racing. The first race started in about 5 knots with the breeze building to 8-10 knots for the second race and peaked at around 12-15 knots for the third with typical choppy sea breeze waves. All divisions completed their scheduled races with 2 for the Masters and 3 for the Open fleets.

In the Open the top 5 places remained the same with Sam Meech holding his overall lead with a 1/2/3 day to lead by 3 points from Andy Maloney (2/3/4) and Tom Saunders (1/3/9). Leading overseas sailor Jianan Wu from Korea again had a consistent day as did Mitchell Kennedy from Australia to hold their 4th and 5th places respectively. We are now halfway through the series and with the discard kicking in tomorrow it remains an extremely tight race for the top spot between the 3 NZ Olympic squad members.

In the Radials Olympic aspirant Susannah Pyatt has leapfrogged the Youths to lead overall by a point from leading youth George Gautrey. Tim Adair (Y), Sara Winther and Alastair Gifford (Y) round out the top 5 but again the order is likely to change tomorrow as several sailors will be looking forward to the discard coming into play. Leading youth female continues to be Jia Kim form Korea who had an excellent 2nd in todays second race to hold 8th overall. The extra breeze in the last race allowed Open sailor George Lane to score a bullet to be the leading Open sailor in 6th place overall.

In the Masters the top placings remained true to form with Scott Leith taking out both Radial races to maintain his perfect score and AM Kris Decke scoring a 1/2 in the Standards to hold a commanding lead. In the Radials Apprentice Tony Evans held on to second overall to be followed by two GM’s, Kevin Welsh and Kev Jenkins who both had greta days with two top 5 placings. In the Standards Mark Patterson (M), UK visitor Terry Scutcher (GM) and Peter Kempkers (GM) from Wakatere are all dead heated on points to hold second third and fourth overall. Andrew Dellabarca in 5th is also poised once he is able to discard a 19th from the first light wind race this morning and Pupuke’s Robert Bland had a great day with a 3/4 to show potential to upset the leaders in the remaining races.

In the 4.7 the honours were shared today between first day leader Philip Governale and Japanese visitor Emiri Koya, both scoring a 1/2 today to leave Philip still leading overall.

The forecast for tomorrow is 15 knot Northerlies which should again provide great racing conditions. Many of the masters will be hoping the breeze kicks in earlier than today so they get to enjoy the fresher breeze that the Open fleets had for their 3rd race today.

Nick Page