Our next member joined the CYCA when he was just 16 years old! Julian Farren-Price has owned multiple yachts throughout his membership, being a fixture in the CYCA’s Ocean Pointscore with his Cookson 12, About Time.
Julian has won 10 Ocean Pointscores and competed in numerous Sydney Gold Coast Yacht Races. In 2018, Julian purchased a Cookson 50 and went on to compete in his first Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race in 2019!
CYCA Member Since: 1980
Favourite CYCA memory: Trying to get on my Northshore 38 at low tide on the old pylon marina, a leap of faith that you would not end up in the drink. John Messenger left a wonderful legacy with our fabulous floating marina. I enjoyed racing against him in his Northshore 38 Wings. He was stiff competition and beat us more than we beat him.
Proudest achievement: Marrying well and having 2 outstanding daughters. If you are talking about sailing probably the whole 17-years I owned my Cookson 12, with the 10 Ocean Pointscore wins definitely the crowning glory.
Bucket-list event still to attend/enter: New York Yacht Club cruise (although not for a few years given the current terrible situation). Have done 21 RSYS cruises and would like to see how the Yanks measure up. Also, Antigua Race week looks phenomenal!
Best thing about the CYCA: Location, marina, general atmosphere and of course the wonderful Sailing Office staff.
Favourite sailing book/movie and why: Have always had a soft spot for the Movie “The Dove”. Great story about a 16-year-old who, in 1973, started a 5-year sailing voyage around the world in a 23-foot boat. His girlfriend followed him around on her motorbike. I’ll never forget the scene in the doldrums where after days and days he decided the answer was to burn the boat! Amazing how the mind works. Special mention for not only the worst sailing movie ever but one that sadly included one of my favourites, Robert Redford, “All is Lost.” It certainly was 2 hours of my life lost!
Outside of sailing I…: beat myself up playing golf, makes sailing look like a doddle. You are just about ready to give it up and you hit one good ball and then you are booking in for the next week. Bit like Sydney to Hobart really (I am allowed to say that now I have 1 Hobart to my name having done the 75th).
Advice to my younger self: “we are not playing for sheep stations”, and not just to my younger self. Especially when young, I took sailing way too seriously and lost sight of the fact we are there to have fun with a team doing their best. Don’t know why putting a helm in a person’s hand changes their personality.
What’s next? I am looking forward to the next adventure with a new boat on order. Certainly can time it – deposit placed in December with Italian builder! COVID-19 has slowed the build of the 2nd Neo 430 Roma but that suits me fine at the moment. It is effectively a bigger version of my Cookson 12 with a nice interior and carbon build like the current Cookson 50. Should arrive early 2021 and I’m intending to cruise up to the reef with some mates and do Hamilton Island Race week next year with my crew.
