Race abandoned as smooth conditions stymie sailing
Watersport took centre stage last week with the Hobie 16 and Flying Fifteen KZN Championships offshore Durban.
SAILING took centrestage last week with the Hobie 16 and Flying Fifteen KZN championships offshore Durban.
Scheduled for the adopted long weekend from 13 to 15 June, both the Flying Fifteen and Hobie were set to sail the Hobie 16 and Flying Fifteen KZN provincial championships under the Point Yacht Club burgee, offshore of Durban.
The Youth Day weekend saw 25 boats compete in the three day weekend with Patrick Harris and his long time sailing partner Jeremy Kriek reclaim their honour claiming the honours in the Flying Fifteen fleet and Peter Hall sailing with his daughter Sara-Ann, victorious in the main fleet of the Hobies. Peter's son Matthew, helming a Hobie Dragoon, took the win with young Jessica Albert. Claiming victory in the Hobie 14 fleet, Greg de Beyer won five out of the six races.
Race Officer for the event, Hemraj Gokal got in seven races for the larger Hobie 16s and the next main fleet, the Flying Fifteens got in a disappointing four races ib total as the gorgeous winter weather set in, hampering sailing offshore.
On Saturday Gokal got in four races for the Hobies and three for the Flying Fifteen guys as they had still to sail back into the harbour. On beginning the regatta, the competitors were greeted with dead flat water, and around eight knots settling into the north east. Once racing got underway there were very few windshifts.
In race one and three, overall winners in the Flying Fifteens, Harris and Kriek were pushed by the rest of the fleet with a lot of place changing on the downwind legs but in race two they lead from start to finish.
Sunday morning saw water as smooth as glass and by 11am the forecast hadn't changed so the fleet agreed to abandon racing for the day. The conditions were much the same on Sunday but the sailors managed to get in one race before the scheduled end of racing.
In the Hobies, Peter Hall and Sara-Ann enjoyed podium finishes in all of their seven races. One race was discarded giving them four firsts and two second places and being awarded 2015 KZN Champs. The duo of Sean Fennessy and Bart Fokkens ended with an impressive three first places, two seconds and a fourth in the races that counted.
The next big event for the local sailors is the SAS Grand Slam in August, the largest multi class regatta in KZN.
In the meantime the Point Yacht Club is focusing their efforts supporting the McNeill brothers, Rudy and Michael in their dream of qualifying for the Olympics. The brothers head off to Canada to compete in the final round of qualifications for Rio.
