Day two in the Hamilton Island Farr 40 Australian Championship saw the fleet start the day in a steady nor’east breeze, which dropped out during race five. 

The top breeze of the day was 15 knots and the swell that caused a number of wipe-outs in the fleet yesterday dropped off.  The 23 boats racing in the fleet enjoyed a great first race after eventually getting away having had two general recalls.  

Overnight leader Richard Perini finished race four in the series in fourth after pulling back seven boats.  Current World Champion Jim Richardson, who led the fleet round the track, took the gun ahead of Steve and Fred Howe’s Warpath.  Hasso Plattner’s Morning Glory and David Urry’s War Games had to make penalty turns at the top mark during the first race.  

Race two had the breeze drop out and the race committee had to shorten the course to accommodate the shift.  Warpath had lead the fleet around the track until they miscalculated a manoeuvre which allowed New Zealand’s Venom skippered by Brett Neill to get past them and win the race from Barking Mad. 

Barking Mad’s first and third places today has moved them into first place overall with the Italian team of Nerone, being skippered by Mark Heeley for this regatta, maintaining their second place.  Perini’s Evolution slipped back to third after a fourth and twelfth places today.  ‘We managed to pull Warpath back and the second has helped our cause’ commented Richardson.

After waiting to see what the conditions would provide the race committee decided to abandon racing for the day and sent the fleet home.  The committee had been advised of a severe weather warning and the breeze had become unpredictable.  

Provisional Results Day 2: 

1st Barking Mad J.Richardson USA                    22

2nd Nerone M.Mezzaroma/A.sodo Migiori ITA     23

3rd Evolution R. Perini AUS                               24

4th TWT M.Rodolfi ITA                                      30

5th War Path S &F Howe USA                            40

6th Ichi Ban M. Allen AUS                                  43

7th Team Shockwave N. Crichton AUS               51

8th Sputnik I.Wheen AUS                                  52

9th Emotional Hooligan M.Blackmore AUS           55

9th Morning Glory H.Plattner                              55

11th Pegasus P.Kahn USA                                  58

11th Mascalzone Latino V.Onorato ITA                 58

13th Southern Star J.Calvert-Jones AUS              59

14th Kokomo L.Walker AUS                                62

15th Venom B. Neill NZL                                     71

16th Panther S.O’Rourke AUS                             75

17th Fiamma A.Barnaba ITA                                77

17th War Games D.Urry AUS                               77

19th Belle Property C.Meehan AUS                       79

20th Bobby’s Girl J.Melville NZL                             87

20th Brighton Star D.Gotze AUS                            87

22nd Solution J.Thompson USA                             88

23rd Short Shipped M.Short AUS                            107

Results available at https://www.cyca.com.au/sysfile/downloads/hif40_ps.htm