WYC provided 6 of the 11 competitors in this year's Around French Island Classic run from Cowes:
- Steve & Vincent Cross in Hobie 18 - Felony
- Lachie Gibson & Chris Wierzsbowski in Tornado - Nothing Too Serious
- Andrew Hill & Nicholas Jurovic in Taipan 4.9 - Infinite + Beyond
- Robert & Luke Pease in Hobie 16 - Double Trouble
- Adam Smith & David Burford in Hobie 16 - BlackJack
- Xavier Vandame and Laurinda Dugay in Hobie 16 - Florence
CYC generously delayed the briefing and the start of the race by 10 minutes to give the WYC boats time to get across from Balnarring in the light winds. Lachie and Chris arrived with minutes to spare - apparently a big night on Friday made the early start challenging!
The fleet started Le Mans style at 10:10 and the 1st strategic call was going towards French island or stay close to Philip Island. Philip Island looked better and that is where BlackJack and Florence went. But it turned out French side was better where Infinite+Beyond went. Double Trouble and Felony stayed in the middle looking for puffs. Lachie and Chris just hoisted the big blue asymetric spinaker on Nothing Too Serious and gradually disappeared over the horizon far out in front.
As we entered the East Arm, another strategic choice: continue deep into Coronet Bay or gybe in towards French island. The French island side paid off with good gusts of wind and allowed BlackJack and Florence to get back on the race and rounding the half way mark with minutes to spare on the 3 hour time limit but Double Trouble, Felony and Infinite+Beyond not far behind were allowed to continue by the race committee.
After the half way mark, Florence was sailing more north following the route of the Taipan and Hobie 18 from CYC. BlackJack not far behind decided to sail closer to French Island in shallow waters which paid off. Seeing that, Double Trouble followed and Florence had to tack and get closer to the island. This was risky has the wind was lighter, the water shallow snd the tide going out!! The wind died, Double Trouble, BlackJack and Florence got stuck together with the Taipan and Hobie 18 for a new start with Infinite+Beyond and Felony closing fast. Rudders touchiing the mud and the wind complete dead was very risky!!
Double Trouble managed to take second place briefly then BlackJack for a few minutes with Florence very close behind. When the breeze came back Florence skilfully found it first and managed to pull away to a good lead over BlackJack and Double Trouble.
When the boats reached the north west corner of the island entering the Hastings channel the sea breeze had picked up to 18-20 knots and all the boats had a long 2h+ beat on the wind!
Meanwhile Lachie and Chris crossed the line just after the 5 hours mark and retired to the balcony at CYC to see if anyone else would turn up!
Floirence managed to hold their advantage on the boats behind till the end of the channel where BlackJack managed 2 good wind shifts and caught up to finish a little over a minute behind Florence. Infinite+Beyond was also closing fast until they managed a capsize on the home straight and turned turtle - a major delay!
However while Xavier & Laurinda's time was good enough to take the win on yardstick, they finished 15 minutes outside the 6 hour time limit leaving Lachie and Chris as this year's champions.
French Island was again an awesome event. The constantly changing yacht positions meant that no one could be sure of the outcome. The light winds that had Adam resorting to sending Ange to do doughnuts around Xavier to slow them down (Laurinda convinced her son to return the favour two fold), the Hobie Vortex to the north of the Island that had us bobbing around like ducks for an eternity, Laurinda trying to spot BlackJack during the life threatening double trap around the north-west corner and across the channel turning back to see Xavier almost disappear overboard, and most memorable was Xavier and Laurinda's 'Lazarus' like come back from the dead to almost win the race.
A special thanks to all the support boat crews including Terry, Frank, Wilem, Ange and Peta from WYC.
RESULTS
Last Modified on 15/01/2016 23:09