Light air specialists the ones to watch at skiff nationals
Queensland’s Hervey Bay is renowned as the whale-watching capital of Australia but yesterday it was the giants of sailing who entertained spectators aboard a tour boat as Race 4 of the 2025 Hervey Bay Boat Club 13ft and 16ft skiff national championships was fought and won.
The breeze was in two minds for much of the day, dithering between south-east and north-east before deciding to fade completely, which meant that the second scheduled race had to be abandoned and deferred until Thursday.
Accordingly, the lighter crews and light-air technicians got their chance to shine, with the young Bella Group Services crew from Belmont 16s proving to be the brightest of all. With 17-year-old Craig Wright on the helm, and Griffin Suters and Rohan Perceval on the wires, they showed that a maiden win in last year’s nationals was no fluke.
“We’re a young team just trying to keep things simple, and our hearts were beating there at the end,” Wright said. “We sail with the CYCA youth academy over winter so we’re pretty used to sailing in under 10 knots – today we were able to get clear air and choose where we wanted to go.”
Suters added: “We’re about 15 kilos less than the big boys, and we certainly feel it in the heavy winds, but in conditions like today we absolutely made the most of it. The start was pretty tight as our GPS showed just 0.5m on the gun – we had the thought of being OCS [On Course Side] in the back of our minds so to get the hooter at the end was a big relief.”
Modern Concept Constructions (Kurt Hansen) showed it could handle any breeze by claiming second place, adding to a first and two seconds in the previous heavy-air heats. They’ve now inherited the yellow leader’s vests from Imagine Signage (Nathan Wilmot), which was patched up from a series of breakages and could only manage 9th.
Daniel Turner, Matt Stenta and Gus Williams on Moonen Yachts emerged from the pack to finish third across the line and regain third place overall.
The Harken 13ft Skiff team (Tayla Lees and Oliver Barrett) won by more than two minutes to move up the leaderboard. The surprise package of the day were Hamish Skelton and Sophie Drummond on Cheeky Skelcon – both come from the Flying 11 class and have only sailed the 13ft Skiff six times previously.
“Today was a bit lighter, which suited us better because we’re not the heaviest crew out there,” Drummond said. “There’s a lot of competition and some really good crews, so the wind strength was definitely on our side.”
Racing resumes on January 9 and concludes on Saturday, 11 January. Key regatta sponsors are The Boat Club Hervey Bay, Fraser Coast Regional Council and Fraser Island Boat Charters. More details at the event website.
Results: https://ty.skiffs.org.au/assa/202425/
Daily video: https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1DHmFcp2TD/
– Mark Rothfield
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