The Advanced Squad put their training into practice today with the first winter Match Racing Regatta.  The Navionics Regatta is sponsored by Vice Commodore Garry Linacre who also took on the role of Principal Race Officer for the day.

The south-westerly of 10-15 knots that greeted the competitors this morning was considerably better than the 30 – 40 knot southerly that featured in weather forecasts throughout the week.

The regatta was convincingly won by Jay Griffin and his crew of Will Parker and David Thackray who did not lose a match all day.  The Umpires and Race Committee found themselves with an unbreakable tie for places second to fourth and reverted to a draw to finalise the positions. 

Amanda Scrivenor and her team of Catherine Trew, Alexandra Paton and Natalie Greentree, the only all girl team competing, drew 2nd place with Keiran Searle and his team of Jono English and Rob Scrivenor picking 3rd place out and Will Ryan and his team of Sean O’Rourke and Ted Hackney left with 4th position.  Will and his team did remarkably well having missed the first two flights this morning as he and his team were all sitting a maths exam. The boys managed to back up the exam with 4 wins on the course so hopefully the exam went well for them too.

Today was Kingsley Forbes-Smith’s first regatta as the ChUmp and the Umpires all did a great job with few questions being fielded at the debrief.  Kingsley commented that the competitors did very well with close racing being affected by not only 400 wind shifts but other traffic on the race course as well.

As a number of our regular Advanced Squad were unavailable today, several of the Development Match Racing Squad stepped up to fill in the gaps gaining invaluable experience. 

The CYCA would like to thank Garry and Navionics for their continued support and sponsorship of the event. 

These regattas are very important in advancing the skills of our teams as they continue preparation for up coming events in both Australia and overseas in the next few months.