2013 PT Internationals, Wellington this Easter

[tonyquoll]

2013 Swire Shipping Paper Tiger Catamaran International Championships will be hosted by Muritai Yacht Club (Wellington Harbour) over Easter; 29th March to 1st April 2013.

Entries were by selection, based on performance at recent National Titles.

Find more info on the Club website: http://www.myc.org.nz/paper-tiger-internationals-2013

Probably find results and updates on the class association website: http://www.papertiger.org.nz/

The Kangaroo team is Bruce Rose, Alex Craig, Bryan Anderson, Luke Stout, Mark Wiggins, Mike Wold, Tony Hastings, Josh Thorpe, Jacob McDonald and Andrew Barnard.

Wombat team includes David Godfrey, Keith Deed, Peter Darling, Ron Wiggins, Russell Jolly, Sarah Ashley-Jones, and Trent Godfrey.

The Kiwi team is probably: Dave Shaw, Scott Pederson, Ryan Leatham, Mark Orams, Scott Barker, Richard Dent, Mike Hood, Peter Robins, Hayden Percy and Scott Hodges, based on results from their Nationals: http://www.papertiger.org.nz/Results/Paper%20Tiger%20Results%286%29.pdf

Weather looking like 20knots and 2m swells! OMG. Well at least the photos and videos should be spectacular

[sando]

Good luck to you and the Aussie team Tony. Do us proud!

[tonyquoll]

Thanks Sando. At this stage we'll be lucky to get a race in; forecasting 30-40 knots & 2m waves all weekend.

http://www.windfinder.com/forecast/eastbourne

Hopefully the weather forecasters are wrong as usual

[tonyquoll]

Pt Internationals results: http://www.myc.org.nz/results/regatta-results/pt-intergalactic-fleet

The day before the event was beautiful. We dragged the boats out of the shipping container, re-assembled them, and enjoyed a perfect day with 10-15 knots.

Day 1 of the event was 25+ so we racing karts instead. Ryan Leatham the champ, with Alex Craig the most entertaining.

Day 2 was forecast at 20-35, but we sailed 4 races in mostly 10-15. It was very patchy, and I later overheard the top guys were adjusting their sails every few hundred meters to adapt to the highly variable wind strength. There was also some chop and possibly tide, which favoured tacking at precise moments. Trick was to find a way that didn't involve hobby-horsing in no wind and coming to a stop. Wish I knew what the trick was!

Day 3 was blown out, with gusts near 40 read on the wind meter on the clubhouse wall. Bowling and mini-golf was great fun. We actually got to know each other better than any previous regatta as we spent a lot more time together in these social settings, and at the club after 4:30 when the bar opened.

The last day I think most of us thought, the hell with it, lets just sail anyway. The club programmed 3 long, back-to-back races, as we looked out at 20-35 knots and thought.... well, this will be interesting!

And it was. The first gybe mark was hillarious, with about 1/3 the fleet cartwheeling with the combined effect of the strong winds and 1m swells. At presentation, we were asked to raise our hand if we didn't either break something or cartwheel at some point that day. Out of 50 skippers, 5 hands went up.

The racing was fantastic; very close all through the fleet. One good tack could win you 2 places, a bad one could cost you 10. The boats were all closely matched, so we were all pushed to hike out, to really try, and every singe point was hard fought.

Dave Shaw won the first 4 races, came 2nd to Bryan Anderson, then cartwheeled but still recovered to 9th. A very impressive effort, and the 1st guy to ever win back-to-back Internationals.

All of the Kiwi team finished in the the top 20, while us Kangaroos ranged from 2nd to 35th. I was pleased enough with 27th, considering I'm a light weight on an old boat who sails on a flat lake. Clearly I still need to learn how to get upwind through chop, but I was stoked to gain places by surfing it off-wind.

Josh was disappointed to come 2nd in the Juniors, and might have won except for an unfortunately crash in the last race. While coming into the top mark on the starboard layline, a boat has tacked in front of him. Josh swerved to go below, but other boat went into irons, and skipper held his boom out to reverse. Josh took a body blow on the end of the boom, went into shock with the injury, then recoverd to sail upto 20th place. His 20th overall is a very impressive effort, especially considering that he has only been sailing a few years and mostly sails flat inland lakes.

As the lightest skipper at the regatta, conditions didn't favour Sarah Ashley-Jones. Congrats to Lynley Manning, our women's champ.

So it was a Kiwi victory all around; Individual Champ, Team prizes, Junior Champ and Female Champ, and even the off-water sport events. But as we say at Wallagoot Lake, "it's not about who wins, it's about how much fun you have." Us Kangaroos were winners on that score.