Race 4 - Winning Appliances
JJ Giltinan
18ft Skiff Championship. |
| By Frank Quealey,
the Australian 18 Footers League and Peter Andrews. |
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Photos by the Australian
18 Footers League
Edited by Peter Andrews. |
| Wednesday, March 9, 2011. |
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| Australian champions Michael Coxon, Aaron Links and Trent Barnabas gave a faultless exhibition on Thurlow Fisher Lawyers to win Race 4 of the Winning Appliances JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour today. The win gives the Thurlow Fisher Lawyers team the outright lead in the series on 9 points, three ahead of defending champion Seve Jarvin and his Gotta Love It 7 team of Sam Newton and Scott Babbage. |
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Smeg chasing Thurlow Fisher Lawyers, during
Race 4 of the Winning Appliances - JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship
on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March 9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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| Second today was Nick Press, Dan Phillips and Dave Ewings on Smeg, which finished 1 minute and 20 seconds behind the winner, while Western Australia’s SLAM with Grant Rollerson, Anthony Young and Peter Nicholson was a further 1 minute and 5 seconds back in third place. |
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The winning crew makes it look too easy, during Race 4 of the Winning Appliances
- JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March
9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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Overall point scores behind Thurlow Fsiher Lawyers and Gotta Love It 7 are US champion Howie Hamlin and his CST Composites team Fritz Lanzinger and Paul Allen on 18 points; John Winning, Andrew Hay and Dave Gibson on Yandoo and Matthew Searle, Archie Massey and Mike McKenzie on Red Claw Wines, both on 23 points; and Smeg on 27 points.
Today’s race was delayed for 1 hour and 45 minutes due to a lack of wind. But when a light north east breeze arrived, another unpredictable race was on. When the fleet eventually got underway, David Mc Diarmid’s New Zealand boat Yamaha appeared to have a great start at far right hand side of the starting line, while Howie Hamlin’s CST Composites and Thurlow Fisher Lawyers opted for the far left hand side. Gotta Love It 7 got away a bit further back within the rest of the pack, gaining little if any ground for the first work up to the Beashel Buoy. |
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Spectrum Trimming was a big improver, during Race 4 of the Winning Appliances
- JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March
9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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| About five minutes into the race, the left-hand side of the course paid dividens for CST Composites, as the tracker indicated they had briefly taken the lead. Then a few minutes later, Thurlow Fisher Lawyers took the lead at a time when the entire fleet was spread out almost right across the full width of the harbour. About half way up to the top mark, Thurlow Fisher Lawyers held a firm lead over CST Composites, SLAM, Jonathan Whitty’s Panasonic, Luke Parkinson’s Spectrum Trimming, Red Claw Wines, Mark Kennedy’s TF Collect, Simon Nearn’s De’Longhi and New Zealand’s CT Sailbattens skippered by Alex Vallings. |
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Queenslander, during Race 4 of the Winning Appliances - JJ Giltinan 18ft
Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March 9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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| After Thurlow Fisher Lawyers rounded the Beashel Buoy, CST Composites was 32 seconds behind, SLAM was 40, Panasonic 59, Smeg was a minute and a second behind the leader, Spectrum Trimming a minute 8, Red Claw Wines 1:13, De'Longhi-Rabbitohs 1:21, defending champions Gotta Love It 7 at 1:24, TF Collect 1:29 and Yandoo at 1:34. |
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It was a tough battle for the minor placings, during Race 4 of the Winning
Appliances - JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday
March 9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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With a little more east in the breeze, all teams completed several gybes downwind to the wing mark at Shark Island, where Coxon, Links and Barnabas had increased pace with Thurlow, now 58 seconds ahead of CST Composites and Smeg; 1 minute and 6 seconds ahead of De’Longhi-Rabbitohs and 1 minute, and 12 seconds ahead Jarvin’s team on Gotta Love It 7, who had moved up to 5th position from 9th. Thurlow’s boat speed was missing yesterday with the number 2 rig, but it was soon obvious that boat speed was not going to be a problem with the bigger number 1 rig that they had up today.
At the bottom mark at Clarke Island for the work back up the harbour to the Beashel Buoy, Coxon and his crew then extended their lead out by another few seconds as Thurlow Fisher Lawyers was now 1 minute and 3 seconds ahead of both CST Composites, a minute 7 ahead of Smeg and a minute 11 ahead of Gotta Love It 7; who had now taken 4th from De’Longhi-Rabbitohs. |
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Smeg was consistant in Race 4 of the Winning Appliances - JJ Giltinan
18ft Skiff Championship on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March 9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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While Thurlow Fisher was dominating the race, the battle for the minor placings was intense with Smeg, CST Composites and Gotta Love It 7 racing with only a few seconds separating the trio. During this second work up to the Beashel Buoy, positions within the top five behind the leader continued to change, with Smeg passing CST Composites about three quarters of the way up to the mark and SLAM passed De’Longhi-Rabbitohs. These positions remained the same after completing another downwind leg back to Clarke Island.
On the final windward leg to the Beashel Buoy all teams elected to sail to the northern shore and SLAM gained time to be within striking distance of Smeg, Gotta Love It 7 and CST Composites. SLAM took a different line to the other three teams competing for the minor placings on the spinnaker run to the wing mark off Shark Island. The move paid dividends as SLAM cut out Gotta Love It 7 and CST Composites, to finish third behind Thurlow Fisher Lawyers and Smeg. |
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The New Zealand crew on Yamaha, waiting for the race to start,
during Race 4 of the Winning Appliances - JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship
on Sydney Harbour, Wednesday March 9, 2011.
Photo © Australian 18 Footers League.
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Replays of the live tracking of each race from the 2011 JJ Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship will be available from: http://www.tractrac.com/index.php?page=eventpage&id=138.
More information and photographs can be found at www.flying18s.com and www.18footers.com.au. Video coverage can be seen also on www.18footers.com.au.
Frank Quealey, Australian 18 Footers League. |
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| Outimage and the
Australian 18 Footers Leaguea © 2011 |
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