SAILING INSTRUCTIONS ARE here  

It is not too late to enter here

A reminder that TODAY IS THE LAST DAY FOR ENTRIES TO THE NATIONALS which will take place the weekend of 11/12 May - i.e. only a 11 days from now.

Following extensive consultations and vote, it has been decided to reschedule the National Championships, which will now take place on the weekend of 11th and 12th May.

Please confirm as soon as possible via email to sail@etchells.org.nz that you intend to take part (YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR MIND LATER).  Please include the name of your boat in any correspondence.

As previously advised, it is intended to run the regatta from Westhaven (per the Auckland Championships in February).  The race area will be between Bean Rock and Rangitoto (weather dependent) and all boats will return to Westhaven each day after racing (under tow if possible).

The will be a prize giving after racing on Saturday at Swashbucklers, including spot prizes from various sponsors including North Sails, Coast New Zealand and Mount Gay Rum.

Please also confirm by email to sail@etchells.org.nz if you have a power boat available to assist with RO duties and/or to tow boats home after racing.  Any help is much appreciated.

Racing instructions will be posted here in doe course, together with a list of entries.

The AGM usually takes place after raciing on the last day of the nationa Champs - because nothing  puts sailors in a party mood more than a properly constituted and quorate meeting.  However, I am proposing that we dispense of any business of the National Association via written resolutions, to be circulated before the National Champs.

If there are any matters that you wish to be raised and discussed, please use this forum.  

In the event that it is not possible to reach a resolution on any matter, an AGM may of course be held in the usual way following the National Champs...

Some have suggested that it is windage, resulting from your correspondent’s massive bulk, others have speculated, more tactfully perhaps, that the back of the fleet offers a better vantage point for these reports, but whatever the reason, Waiwera (1240) has, rather depressingly, secured a slot in economy class, quite near the loos, over the last two outings.  

What is worse, due to a phenomenon that astronomers refer to as Doppler shift, it is surprisingly difficult to distinguish the relative positions of distant objects that are moving away from you, rapidly, so I hope that you will forgive me if this report more than usually subjective and lacking in factual detail.

It was a beautiful spring evening that saw a fleet of 12 Etchells beat into a stable northerly that gave every appearance of building.  But it was all a horrible, fickle pretence and by sunset, the self-same fleet was beating home into a freshening southerly with two, shifty, patchy and (for some) maddening races in the bag – bringing the series total to eight, with Valsheda (950) leading overall, from Feng Shui (1348) and Upfront (814).

Briefly then, Race 1 started off the Viaduct Basin into a tentative breeze and ebbing tide and ended in a bun fight as an ascendant southerly competed fitfully with a dying northerly - with boats crossing the finish line on virtually every point of sail.

It was good to see Bobby’s Girl  (1058) competing for line honours after Johnny Melville’s long spell on the beach (and, paradoxically, Bobby’s Girl’s brief, unplanned, sojourn in the drink).

The start of Race 2 was quickly and efficiently re-positioned off Bayswater by the excellent Race Committee, as the wind completed its about-face - and proved to be a contest far more suited to those who prefer their windward-leewards to occur on alternating legs of the race.

Waiwera (1240) squandered a near-perfect start, failing to maintain momentum through a treacherous minefield of lulls and shifts.  Steadier heads and hands capitalised and Bobby’s Girl (1058) ultimately triumphed.

Many thanks to the race committee for its swift decisiveness in trying conditions.

Results here.

As part of the Mitre10 Roy's Bay Regatta scheduled for late January, 2013, a hardy and active Wanaka Etchells fleet is planning an inaugural  New Zealand Fresh Water Etchells Championship 

The regatta will take place across the long weekend of 25th, 26th & 27th January.  Entries are welcome - please contact Quentin Smith for more details (qksmith@gmail.com).


Updates will be published here.