Light winds on opening day of Etchells Pre-Worlds

Hong Kong (October 24, 2015) – The forecast for the opening day of the Etchells Asia Pacific Championships stayed true to forecast, offering up a light 5 to 7kt breeze on an axis of 070°. International Race Officer Kevin Wilson set the committee boat early, with twin brother Ross coordinating the pin end boat to form a start line for 35 boats.

With a healthy 9kts at the attention signal, the fleet showed a bias towards the committee boat end of the line and, in a competitive start, Martin Webster (AUS) on Highlander and Marvin Beckmann (USA) on The Martian were called over, but both successfully returned to clear the start line. The fleet split evenly up the left and right of the course, with the left paying off.

Laying down a marker for all the visiting boats, Peter Backe (HKG) on Jezebel was the first to reach the windward mark after a 25 minutes beat, followed by Jan Muysken (UAE) on African Queen and Jamie McWilliams’ Wanchai Belle (HKG). After the 1.7nm run from the top mark, Jezebel was still leading, with a 10 minute spread to the back of the fleet.

As the fleet rounded the windward mark for the second time, the breeze began to fade, with only 3 to 4kts bringing in the eventual race winners Jezebel, helmed by Peter Backe, followed by African Queen and Jake Gunther on Australian entry The Boat.

With the final boat finishing 10 minutes after the leaders, the breeze had subsided yet again, leading Wilson to display AP over H and send all boats back into the marina. Given the timings, this meant no more racing for the day and the RO voiced his intent to run three races on Sunday, given a much improved forecast.

Tomorrow’s racing gets underway with an 1100hrs warning signal in the waters east of Hong Kong, off Ninepins Islands.

The Asia Pacific Championship feature six races over three days (Oct 24-26), while the 2015 Etchells Worlds get underway with a practice race on Sunday 1 November, followed by nine races over six days (Nov 2-7) to decide the Etchells World Champions for 2015.

Worlds website – Scoreboard

Report by RKHYC media