53rd Geraldton Ocean Classic
It’s all over bar the shouting and there is a new record on the books. The fastest time was 17 hours 11 minutes and 22 seconds set by Craig Carter with India back in 2015. David Davenport and his TP52 Crush brought it home in 16 hours and 24 minutes for line honours with Enterprise NG piloted by Anthony Kirke came in close to the old record time of 17 hours and 32 minutes for second over the line, but first on handicap.
All that and the start was a drifter, imagine if the breeze had already filled in….?
But this is a story about the little boat that could.
Matt Rose has been campaigning his SS27 now for a number of years on the river and has faithfully taken the boat down the river, under the bridges to compete in the offshore fleet in Div 2. Doing so, he has kept the SoPYC links going with the offshore community and is admired by all for his tenacity. But there is more to this.
This is the 50th anniversary of the PHS win by the first SS27 – Touché, owned and built by Kim Swarbrick and sailed to glory in 1973. Kim was invited on board to navigate this year’s Geraldton trip and to enjoy the run up the coast. We saw brief glimpses of Matt’s preparation as he bounced around the river one windy day in September with his bright red storm jib on show. Tony Edman took his SS27 Trail Blazer up in 1993 and they won the Lobster Pot Series which forms part of the entertainment at Geraldton. With the take-up of the skiff hulls that allow the downwind runs at high speed, the records have tumbled, but the costs of yachting have risen in response to the need for speed.
There was a time when the race took a while and the journey there and back was relished by all. Thinking of this, we can’t take it away from Chris Hind and his boat Sagacious IV though, as while he shifted the boat down to Fremantle to be able to do offshore, he still called SoPYC home and both he and Matt sailed the only displacement hulls in the race. And you can tell – straight up the rhumb line to Geraldton.
The size of the fleet is possibly reflected by the recent Exmouth Race and Rally where a number of crews and skippers would have used up their leave passes and are bringing their boats back up to scratch.
Well done to starters and volunteers as well to the admin team that worked those long hours to ensure that the race could go ahead, though I don’t miss those long hours doing radio skeds into the night and tracking the boats manually in the radio room at the club. Modern-day communications has its place in yacht racing.
By the way…. King Canute, the smallest boat in the fleet has provisionally won Division Two.
Well done the little boat that could.
