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.

Perfect sailing weather today (it’s always like this at Sandy!) with a 10 knot SE breeze and flat water. Shirts and shorts sailing so the northern hemisphere overseas visitors are very happy. Three races in today and the big mover is Jet with two bullets and a second to Convicts in race 6. With the drop now in place this brings the leader board to Pacemaker on 9 points from Jet on 13, two back to Convicts and a further five back to By the Lee.
For full results go to the SYC site here

In a great display of sailing our ‘Local Guest’ skipper Peter Lee (Brendan’s father – ‘By the Lee’) sailing one of our youth boats ‘Sidetracked’ in a last minute entry finished 3rd (11 places ahead of the boy racer son) in one of the races and was up there for most of the other two. We’ve always known that Sidetracked (a revitalised Jarkan) was a fast boat and that Pete is a good driver (he taught Brendan all he knows – and plenty he has forgotten). Might be time to think about your own boat Pete !

In other news; After yesterday’s clean racing we have the first protests today so the room will be busy – a certain lady skipper in the middle of it I gather. Bruce Alexander on Gunboat with a new crew did a bit of trawling with the kite but was otherwise in the thick of it. Dave McKay on Stockcar had his drop with an OCS – gotta listen to the radio Dave !

In general the racing is tight with an average of 35 – 40 min per race and the fleet finishing within 4 minutes in each race. Tomorrow is a lay day, so racing resumes on thursday.

After an abandoned practice day and with the possibility of Day One being a no-go as well it is great to be able to say we got 3 good races in. The first two races were with most people on genoas in 12 – 15 knot SE breeze and the third race onto jibs with the wind coming in around the 18-20knot mark.
As wind came up the shifts got trickier and swung through a wider arc with the beach side of the course paying dividends more often than not. A little confusion with reading the sailing instructions or not …! saw a number of boats taking the unnecessary scenic route around the hitch mark on the second leg …. uugh! In general the fleet was well behaved and everyone is happily back in the marina showing off their battle flags.
The Black Prince of Sandringham is in the lead with a 1,2,1 from Steve Girdis, Brendan Lee, Ron Thomson and Simon Grain.
For full results go to the SYC site here

Hi all

Great to see everyone starting to get into motion today, lots of boat polishing going on, forestay flags being hoisted, and most importantly – eating! After what has been a tough December for many, and a perhaps somewhat less-than-festive festive season, there were plenty of relieved faces peering down at the scales! Well done to all those who lost, maintained or gained weight under some pretty close scrutiny!

But…we are only just beginning. There a few things that we need to nag you about still. First – the presentation night. Apologies in advance for the hassling, but we have a deadline for numbers with the club. On offer is an amazing two course menu – we’ve trawled through their options and selected the absolute best!

Entree is either of the
– duck salad with orange segments, fried noodles, shallots and ponzu vinaigrette (gf)
Or
– scallops with pulled pork and apple sauce

Main is a selection between
– chargrilled eye fillet with mustard cream dauphinoise potato, sautéed kale, Dutch carrot and jus gras (gf)
Or
– sesame crusted salmon fillet with wasabi mash, shiitake mushrooms, Bok Choy and ponzu beurre Blanc sauce (gf)

Combine that with complimentary drink on arrival and the Crawdaddys keeping us addicted to the dance floor and it promises to be a night not to be missed!

We do need everyone’s rsvp and payment tomorrow though, so please don’t delay!

Also, the Helys have generously donated a boat cover for auction, with proceeds to go to our much loved absent sailor – Luke Matthews. Please check it out, and if you fancy keeping those nasty uv rays from damaging your deck, all while earning you some awesome karma, then we’d like to hear some bids!!

Good luck all!

Kirb

The Nationals are upon us and the activity in the boat park is ramping up, boat polish and winch grease, rigs down, rigs up. The battle draws near.

But …………. there are the fun parts to the carnival – parties and their posters. Click on the posters for all the details !

Tuesday night at the club in the members bar is the ‘J’ themed party, including a DJ

J Party Poster

Friday night is the big one – the presentation night, where the Black Prince is crowned again  …..
or  …  toppled  !!!

Complimentary drinks on arrival, plus a live band – ‘The Crawdaddys’ – (Great band it seems, “Now firmly rooted in the Melbourne music scene, multi-instrumentalist Andrew Healey and The Crawdaddys has been entertaining audiences all over Australia for over 15 years. As a solo artist, his stage-perfected blend of groove-based guitar, soulful vocals and eclectic songwriting delivers a carefully-woven sound that is equally suited to a chilled Sunday afternoon or a rocking Friday night.)

That’s us … with the band rocking the Friday night party

Anyway here is the Presentation Poster

2016_Presentation Poster

Kirby has been tasting the pastries and thumbing the keyboard again – smile on her face as she is in paaaarty mood – read on for your calendar of regatta fun.

If you’re tired of popping into the little local Brighton organic cafe to pick up your free-trade chai latte, double shot, extra hot and constantly overhearing the same conversation, “so many Christmas paaaahties daaaaahling – my head might just explode!” – well now you can fire back with, “Oh I knooooooow!

And 2016 – it just doesn’t stop! Paaaahtay, paaaahtay, paaaahtay!!!”

So people, please bring along those overloaded and precious diaries to the registration before the regatta, because we need to know numbers for those fabulous paaahtays please.

Expect to be RSVP’ing for:

– Sunday BBQ – too late, you’ll be there and after the three day fast you went on to make the 400kgs, tipping you won’t need a second invitation to dig in

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– Tuesday ‘J’ party (see newsletter 5 for the theme explanation) – actually, again, no RSVP needed. We know you’ll be there – who in their right minds would miss the chance to see Pope Francis (he’s a Jesuit, before all the nit pickers complain about the lack of J…) getting jiggy with J Lo on the dance floor??! And it’s the first of only two regatta nights that are followed by a morning where you can legally tell your skipper to nick off, that you’re hung over and he/she can jolly well go and do whatever pointless task it is themselves!

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– Lay Day – we will be asking for ‘an expression of interest’ for this one, coz Huey gets last say on pressing the go button and it will be a DIY ferry-booking to join us for an awesome lunch, so it’s pretty flex. I’ll send around the link to the ferry soon…..

.
– Presentation Night! Diaries out, pencils away, this one needs ink! We need to let SYC know numbers pretty early for this so that we’re not all fighting over just the one plate of saveloys and party pies. It’s $75 a head and we will be asking for you to put your money down by Monday 4th please, but it will be the most fabulous of the paaaahtays so don’t miss out – it’s also the second night before the morning after where you can tell your skipper to go away and come back when your brain has managed to fit back inside your skull, so it should be a doozie!!

So enjoy all your Christmas and New Year paaaahtays people, consider them practice for the real ones that we’ll be having next year!

Hi Guys and Girls, more news from Kirby

It’s that time of the year again…well actually it’s normally around October, but with the National Titles coming up, nagging season is upon us again. Everyone sailing in the regatta needs to be a paid up J24 member of their state association and the earlier the better really, so that you can stop being pestered and I can stop my stalking campaign.

Let’s not have Christmas dinner interrupted with the debt collectors calling to chase $50 (and no matter how boring you might reckon your in-laws are, no … a conversation with a debt collector is not going to be more fun). And NYE, you just want to be counting down from 10 seconds to midnight, not counting off your bank account details to an automated voice on telephone banking. So what better time than now could there be to get this chore over and done with??!!

To join the VICTORIAN ASSOCIATION ONLY, use the easy online credit card option (goes through PayPal, but you don’t need an account – just your card details) is here:  https://j24.com.au/?page_id=3609

Or, if you prefer, the banking details for sending an EFT are here:
You can also do a direct debit to the association’s account. Please add your name in the reference description if you use this method.
The details for the bank are BSB: 083-231    Acct No: 01-897-1390,    J24 Association of Victoria.
Thanks in advance everyone for making this as short a nagging season as possible!

Of course if you need to join your own state association before you arrive in Melbourne, then now is probably a good time to call your state secretary – find their contact details on your respective state page from the links above.

 

ENTRIES CLOSE TOMORROW, NOW WOULD BE A GOOD TIME TO ATTEND TO THIS LITTLE MATTER !

Yes of course you can do a late entry but it costs you more and makes it harder for the organisers to cater correctly

Kirby, our Vegas Treasurer, who writes way better than I do, has hit the keys and come up with some hot new info – well we said there would be more, so keep coming back for updates. Read on avid readers !

Just a few bits of extra info for the upcoming Monjon National Championships to keep everyone in the loop as we get ever closer to race day! There’s lots going on, we’ll have battle flags up and flying which will very definitely put our stamp on the marina, there’ll be tracking on board all boats with some swanky new live tracking (thanks to John Neville’s company Data Agility, now people on shore can watch the race live online) and the end of each day’s sailing will be celebrated (our mourned…) with a beer courtesy of the association. There are BBQ’s, parties and even an exciting AGM will all be put on for your enjoyment, so this regatta will be one that you don’t want to miss!! If you are sitting on the fence on whether or not to make a tilt at taking home one of this year’s trophies or medals, then now is the time to take the plunge. There are quality boats and quality local crew still on offer for those wanting to join in, so don’t let the lack of a boat or people to crew it slow you down.

A few things in more detail:

Theme Night:

The theme night for this year is “J”, and with a bit of thought, I think you’ll agree that this is a ripper of a theme (thanks Joelle for your inspiration here!) It works for everyone, including:

– The lazies amongst us. Throw on some black jeans and white trainers and hello Jerry Seinfeld, what could be easier?

– The more ambitious folk. Go for the full Donald Trump ensemble and tell everyone you’re a jerk.

– People in bad moods. If you don’t think you’ll be able to keep it together for the evening without totally losing your s**t, then pop on a pair of white shorts and voila – John McEnroe and any profanity or tantrums on the night can be chalked up to being ‘in character’ – perfect!

This party takes place on the Tuesday night before the lay day, so I think a very big night is in order, and then you’re guaranteed to wake up happy that we have that contentious day off!

The Lay Day:

Weather permitting, we will be heading off from St Kilda by ferry to Williamstown for lunch, so that J folk from near and far see a side of the bay that they less commonly visit. More on this as we get closer to the day and find out if Huey has co-operated with us enough to keep the lay day, or if we spend the Wednesday on the water.

Presentation Night:

With the fabulous MC’ing skills of one Doug McGregor, don’t miss this chance to congratulate the star performers of the regatta, on and off the water. Surely a Victorian boat will take out the title, and you’ll want to be there to congratulate them on the night! And don’t be the one who has to wait until the next day to see who takes out the inaugural J24 Clown Shoe Award, for the person who has succeeded in stepping on the most toes.  😉  For a mere $75, dinner will be in the Port Phillip room at the club and promises to be a great night.

More information to come, watch this space! … Kirby.