Ginger led virtually all the way to take line honours, first place on PHS handicaps and winner of the Milson Memorial Cup, one of the RSYS’s most prestigious perpetual trophies. Ginger also won the IRC Division.

Originally scheduled to be sailed offshore, RSYS race officials elected to run the race around Harbour marks because of forecast strong to galeforce winds offshore.

On the Harbour, the pouring rain caused several ‘white-outs’ with southerly wind gusts of 25 knots+ early in the afternoon. 

However, by mid-afternoon the wind had swung to the south-west and eased, causing frustrating dead patches in the lee of Bradley’s Head and down the Harbour.

The weather outlook saw only 19 starters out of 46 entries for the Milson Memorial Cup, with Ginger taking line and corrected time from Julian Farren-Price’s Cookson 12 About Time in the combined PHS Division. Ginger’s corrected time margin was a massive 11 minutes.

Third place in PHS overall went to Imagination (Annette & Robin Hawthorn) while in the IRC Division Ginger won from About Time and Mr Beak’s Ribs (David Beak).  Ginger’s winning IRC margin was six minutes.

CYCA director Howard Piggott skippered Brilliant to top place in both the IRC and PHS Division 3 results. Brilliant won Division 3 IRC from Zephyr (James McConnell and Alex Brandon) and Amante (Dennis Cooper).  In PHS, Brilliant won from Therapy (Tom Cehak) and Time Out (Peter Blair & Ross Gardyne).

While Ginger sailed the Harbour course in 2 hours 47 minutes 15 seconds,  the last boat to finish, Soundtrack (Tim and Adrian Cox) took 5 hour 2 minutes and 32 seconds, as the wind virtually shut down mid-afternoon.

In the Squadron Harbour fleet, the faster yachts in the mixed divisions also benefited from the mid-race wind change in direction and strength, while the slower boats also suffered the worse of the huge outgoing tide.

“We got through the race in good breeze to finish before the wind shut down behind us,” commented David Kellett, sailing master of Charles Curran’s  Sydney.  The 60-footer finished 36 minutes ahead of the next boat to take out the double of line and handicap honours in the RSYS Division 1.

Another CYCA boat to win its division in the RSYS harbour racing was Peter Campbell’s Bonbridge 27, Hornblower, which won Division 4. – Peter Campbell