The World’s Most Popular One-Design Keelboat
EARLY BIRD RATE EXTENDED TO 11 MARCH!! If you race a J24, there is a dedicated division for you to race one design over the 2016 Easter long weekend on the pristine waters of Botany Bay. Entries open, see the Notice of Race and promotional poster
Email the organisers at regatta@bbyc.com.au or call Kelly on 0439 404 156 if you would like to know more.
www.bbyc.com.au
The J24 elite will converge on Japan in September this year for the 2016 World Championships. Wakayama is a seaside town near Osaka and in September the weather is perfect for yacht racing, with average temperatures at 25 degrees and winds generally in the 8 -10 knot range. The Japanese are very friendly and love J24’s, so this is a regatta well worth putting in the calendar if you can get there. Charter boats are still available, and very good boats can be chartered for around $3600 for the regatta and return airfares are available from $1200 with Qantas. This could be the best value World Championships we will see for a long time!
World Championships are the greatest events on the sailing calendar and start life long friendships and memories, so let me know if your interested and we will try and put an Australian team together. To get one of the very few charter boats still remaining, please let me know by the end of February if you would like to be there.
Dave Suda : stormyachting@hotmail.com
Event Website here
Just in case you missed the Nationals AGM, longtime J24 measurement guru Peter Stevens and recently awarded J24 Life Member, has a modified role and is now our class records and technical officer. We must thank Peter for his continued support of the class, much of his hard work goes unnoticed!
In 2016 we are going to be focusing our measurement efforts on inventory and safety equipment.
Just about every J24 still racing competitively has been measured in detail over the last ten years and now our focus will shift to ensuring that everybody is carrying all inventory items that they list on the inventory.
For more information on this article and 2016 measurement, please go to the Measurement page here
The J24 Victorian association is doing some late editing to the events calendar of 2016. Given that we’ll all turn up to the opening of an envelope, it seems very wrong that we miss the opening of a new marina on Port Phillip! So on the weekend of 27/28 February, we are planning a weekend away so that the J’s can be seen at the “Grand Opening” of Wyndham Harbour.
The plan is to sail over there on the Saturday, to arrive in time for the BBQ and live music which takes place from 6-9pm. It’s $10 pp and they cater for vego’s and gf’s and even better, if we book through Wyndham Harbour then the $10 goes to the coast guard as a donation. The berths for the boats are free – now there’s a bargain for a night’s accommodation – even our Scottish skipper might be lured in for this deal! There are portable toilets there and a shower too – so no excuses for being part of ‘the great unwashed’… Drinks are BYO.
Sunday morning, we have the BBQ facilities for the exclusive use of the exclusive J24 association, so the association will put on a breakfast BBQ and we can all fuel up for the race home…or it might end up being a race there on the Saturday…we need to get closer to the weather for the weekend and work out which day looks more likely not to suit Pacemaker (which is any day not ending in ‘y’ really…)
I’m looking into what the accommodation options are for the marina, so hopefully we should still be in luck for finding some good accom at some pretty respectable prices – for those not opting for the free, floating kind. Watch this space…
If you can please let the Vic association know if you are going ASAP and complete the attached form would be excellent – if we book all the berths at once then they’ll put us all in the one spot. RSVP’s to: Kirby O’Brien kirbyobrien@gmail.com
And now it’s welcome to Wyndham!!
Despite there being only one J 24 entered at the 2016 Women in sailing regatta, our girls took out the major placings. On a perfect day for racing on Port Phillip Bay Melbourne, 18 boats varying from 50 feet down to the smallest boat a J24, sailed four heats in ten knots, 28 degrees and smooth seas.
Taking out the major prizes were Kirsty Harris, winner in PHF and Steph Strong winner on a count back in AMS (and also came 3rd on PHF Wisc), both these girls are local J 24 skippers and they and their crews sailing much larger boats just held off Pauliina Matilla and her team in J24 ‘Bruschetta VI’ who came second in both divisions.
Our girls have a pedigree like no other, Paullina’s crew of Sonja Schalin, Madeleine Linton and Maria Vasardani, recently crewed on J’s that came 3, 4 & 5 in the 2016 J 24 Australian Championships, whilst Kirsty and her crew came 6th in the Nationals. Steph and her team sail the J24 Youth boat ‘Sidetracked’ supported by our local fleet and regularly get podium finishes.
The best women’s teams come together from the major clubs around the bay and to see our J 24 girls in first and second, over two divisions is a feather in the cap for the efforts that have been made in encouraging women in our sport. Amongst our local J fleet of 20 boats we have a participation ratio of 40% female skippers or crew.
Well done girls…. a great result. Story by Hugo Ottaway.
Sydney Harbour Regatta, hosted by Middle Harbour Yacht Club on 5 & 6 March 2016, will have a J24 division.
MHYC have a dedicated J24 trophy that they hope to present this year but in order to run the division they need your entry.
This is always a fun and well run regatta and if anyone can turn on great entertainment, it’s MHYC!
For more information, and to enter, visit:
shr.mhyc.com.au
When Doug MacGregor asked Luis Ferreiro to come along and try his hand at yachting photography, he couldn’t have known what a star he was unleashing on us. Luis’ on water photography is superb. Alan Cousins drove the boat all week and got Luis close to the action, in fact I think due to the enormous lens Luis used I believe he had to back away at times.
Luis has captured the action, the excitement, the struggle and the colour of each day in stunning clarity and focus. The shots are brilliant !
Go now to www.sportsnap.com.au and find your boat and marvel at the images. Guys and girls I also urge you to consider purchasing a shot or two to help make Luis’ week long effort worth his while – when you see the images you will know we want him back next time.
Go to www.sportsnap.com.au
Outgoing President Dave Suda preprared a comprehensive report on the past year, this and the minutes are online under ‘About J24″
The Black Prince of Sandringham has been returned to his throne.
The final day was a series of ups and downs. Steve Girdis sailing Convicts Revenge came up from 3rd to claim second and Jet went down to 3rd. With the first race sailed in lighter airs Jet had the edge on speed and moved closer to the top with another win, Dave was getting worried, but as Brendan reminds us all that Simon hadn’t had his bad race yet and he did in the 3rd race of the day – our new drop !
With the breeze building throughout the day Pacemaker reeled off a string of firsts and Convicts a string of seconds – game over.
Brendan and Hugo came in with consistent 3rds and 4ths to cement their overall 4th and 5th positions.
Kirsty steering Robyn Coombs’ Hyperactive took out 6th even with an apparently spectacular Chinese on one of the runs. Ron Thomson won the Thommo Cup but Janette did a great job sailing in the rough conditions to record a very consistent result mid fleet.
The Handicap result mirrored the One Design except that Hugo took out 3rd overall from Jet in 4th.
Final results are here
The committee and club excelled at a memorable presentation dinner, with the usual ‘short Scottish’ speech from President Doug MacGregor and MC for the raffle and other comments from the classes funniest resident wit John Neville. The Victorian committee did a great job with the whole organisation of the regatta, it’s a huge job and the team brought it together very well, the club’s race management volunteers lead by Graeme Watt and Craig Wiley also excelled on and off the track, a big thank you on behalf of all the competitors.
Thanks also to our long time sponsor MonJohn Security for once again supporting the regatta, also to John Neville’s Data Agility and Iguana Design for contributing to the success of the event. Remember if you have a need for security, IT and graphic design, please support our sponsors where you can.
Doug MacGregor organised Luis Ferreiro to come and take pictures both on and off the water and the results are spectacular (well done all those who waved at the right time or put their boats in spectacular positions for the camera). Louie’s pics will be available on www.sportsnap.com.au this is a new site and should have most of the pics loaded by Friday 15 January, (there are over 500 pics I believe) home page pics are there already. I strongly suggest you have a look and support Luis by buying pics of your boat, I think he will be a great and valuable addition to our class and the marine picture business in the future.
A tough day on the water today with Southerly winds of 22-28 knots and big seas – hard work up wind but great surfing downwind.
Only two races were sailed with the third being canned when in the starting sequence, I think many were quite glad to be going back to the marina.
Dave Suda, ‘The Black Prince of Sandringham’ showed his mettle again today with two wins from Simon Grain and Steve Girdis in a tie for second in the first race and from Simon Grain and then Steve Girdis in the second race. Brendan Lee was 4th in both races. Brendan and Dave were both very fast upwind today with Jet picking up the places downwind.
‘Mr J24’ Hugo Ottaway in Bruschetta VI, Robyn Coombs in Hyperactive, Ron Thomson the new National President in Kicking and Dave McKay in Stockcar are the bunch fighting out the placings from 5th to 8th, all pretty close on points and it’s anyone’s final placing in this group.
Of particular note is John Neville in Vice Versa currently lying in 9th and sailing very well, consistent placings have given John his best Nationals position so far – well done John.
Up to yesterday the Thommo Cup was alive and well with equal numbers of wins to both Janette and Ron, but today’s stronger conditions have seen Ron take two wins off Janette, tomorrow’s forecast lighter conditions may suite Janette more. This is the first Nationals the two have battled it out in their own boats, so tomorrow will be an eagerly anticipated climax to this battle.
There are the usual hard luck stories on windy days and Peter Lee’s day came to an abrupt end with the kite and Fitzy’s head being trashed. Fitzy is getting stitches in the Sandy Hospital but is basically ok it appears – hard head !
There are a few skippers licking their unexpected placings at the back end of the fleet. Just remember guys you are in a classy even if smaller fleet than we would like and the boats further up the food chain are not going to give anything away. It’s tough and getting tougher.
A belated welcome to Zibo Madej from CYCSA in Adelaide with a crew of Chinese from Shanghai, not everyone speaks English on the boat, so it is a vertical learning curve for the crew and in today’s conditions it must have been hard work. Well done Zibo and thanks for coming to the regatta, with more practice and time I hope we will see you again and further up the fleet.
The handicap placings are very similar with Dave Suda leading from Simon Grain, Steve Girdis, Brendan Lee and Hugo Ottaway. Not quite sure why that is but the details on both One Design and Handicap are to be found here
If you have regatta stories that we can publish on the website as part of the Nationals coverage please talk to me – we all like to read different points of view.