Two Sydney 38s have been disqualified and a third penalised for racing infringements during yesterday’s opening races of the Rolex Trophy one design series off Sydney Heads.
However, the boats affected were not amongst the top contenders on the pointscore after the first two races.
At protest hearings at the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia last night:
- Uplift (Darryl Hodgkinson) was disqualified under RRS 14 and 15 for failing to give Challenge (Lou Abrahams) room to keep clear after acquiring an overlap just before the start of race one.
- Hidden Agenda (Graham Gibson) was scored a severe DNE in race for failing to give the inside boats Calibre (Geoff Bonus) and Stonybroke (Robin Tedder) room to round a mark in race one which resulted in Calibre colliding with both Hidden Agenda and Stonybroke, and Stonybroke hitting the mark.
- Calibre was penalised two placings in race two for failing to keep clear of Swish (Steve Proud and Will Hutchinson), a starboard tack boat.
In penalising Hidden Agenda, the protest committee drew attention to RRS 2, Fair Sailing, as the contact between Calibre and Hidden Agenda resulted in between $3000 and $4000 damage to Calibre.
A DNE penalty means that if cannot be discarded from an overall series, but in the case of this regatta, all races must count in any case.
After yesterday’s first two races of the three-day Rolex Trophy, Cydon (Leon Christianakis) leads the Sydney 38 One Design class by one point from Estate Master (Martin & Lisa Hill) with Team Lexus (Rupert Henry) four points further back.
