Adelaide named champion youth club for 2016 | VIDEO, STORY

The Adelaide Sailing Club has taken out the overall club honours at the final leg of the SA Youth Tri Series (sponsored by The Sailing Shop) at the weekend, narrowly defeating rivals Brighton and Seacliff Yacht Club in a close finish.

Adelaide went in to the final round of the three-part series narrowly ahead of Brighton and managed to hold on to victory even though Brighton were coming home strong.

Largs Bay Sailing Club finished in third position, ahead of Goolwa Aquatic Club in fourth and Port Lincoln Yacht Club in fifth. Christies Sailing Club and Ceduna Sailing Club also registered points in the Tri Series, which was a fantastic effort for those clubs.

The Tri Series, which has now been running for a number of years, is a three-part South Australian youth regatta designed to get local sailors prepared for national regattas that happen over the Christmas break.

All of the national championships for Australian Sailing’s youth pathway classes, plus championships for a plethora of senior and other classes, will be held on South Australian waters this summer as part of the SA Summer of Sail Festival — the biggest on-water event to ever hit the state.

For more information about the SA Summer of Sail, head to the website.

• For full results click HERE
• For images from the sailing click HERE

Optimist Open

The Optimist Open fleet has been competitive all season and a really strong top group of sailors have been battling it out at the front of the fleet at each of the three Tri Series events.

Brighton and Seacliff’s Alexi Wigglesworth was good enough in the overall series to come away with the victory across the three regattas, even though he slipped to fourth overall in the final round at Adelaide Sailing Club.

He held on to win the overall title by just one point to Adelaide Sailing Club’s Ben Hinks, who came home with a wet sail, dominating the weekend’s racing at his home club.

In third place at both the Adelaide event and in the overall championship was Harry Higgins, who has been sailing incredibly well and will be another solid contender in the standings come nationals.

Taran Sanderson (BSYC), Myles Wilson (ASC) and Carter Baker (LBSC) were another group that sailed really well at all three of the Tri Series events.

The nationals will be held at the Largs Bay Sailing Club from January 2 to January 9 and more than 250 boats in all fleets are expected to compete.

Optimist Intermediate

A total fleet of 10 sailors participated in the Optimist Intermediate fleet throughout the three Tri Series regattas, which gave the group an opportunity to transition from learning in the Green Fleet to racing on the open course.

Ian Irwin from Goolwa Aquatic Club was the overall winner in this fleet having sailed well at all three events in the Tri Series.

He had a great battle with Largs Bay Sailing Club’s Finlay Bunt, who finished only two points behind Ian in second place.

There were a range of other boats that sailed well in the Intermediate Fleet however none of them sailed in more than one of the Tri Series events.

Optimist Green Fleet

Constant improvement and a lot of fun was seen on the Green Fleet courses throughout the Tri Series events with a great fleet of youngsters getting on the water and showing their skills.

Largs Bay Sailing Club showed dominance in this fleet, proving they have a strong foundation for growth of junior sailing at their club.

The top three boats in the overall standings came from Largs with Archie Kretschmer taking the overall win ahead of clubmates Fraser Baker in second and Murphy Cowen in third.

There were some great efforts from a number of other sailors including Lilly Witty, Will Dallisson, Ava Wilson, Darcy Higgins, Sailor Cowen and Dante Schnaars however every single sailor had fun and learned a lot.

The Optimist Green Fleet sailors will also be participating in the nationals at Largs Bay.

Open Bic

A solid fleet of Open Bics were on display at the second and third Tri Series regattas as they prepare for the upcoming nationals at the Henley Sailing Club.

Adelaide Sailing Club’s Jake Wilson was the pick of the bunch, taking out the overall honours rather convincingly ahead of Christies Sailing Club sailors Thomas and Nicholas Ebourne, who were second and third respectively.

There were also some top efforts by Hugo Spees from Goolwa, who unfortunately missed the final leg of the series, and Adelaide’s Jock Hanna, who improved a lot during the series and won the last race.

International Cadet

The International Cadet results were a mixed bag over the three weekends with a lot of boats showing up at the front of the fleet on various occasions, however in the end it was Brooke Gaffney and Darcy Conry in Endless Summer that came away with the win.

The Largs Bay duo were able to hold off clubmates Elise Franson and Rachel Huczko in Cheeky Monkeys by only three points in the 22-race regatta and they were then followed by Oliver Hankinson and Braden Griffiths in High Calibre in third.

Two South Australian cadet sailors are in or on their way to Argentina at the moment to compete in the upcoming world championship, including Alyssa and Mitchell Kelsey and Sam Paynter and Gil Casanova, both hailing from Port Lincoln.

The nationals will be held in late January at the Largs Bay Sailing Club with more than 70 boats already entered.

Laser 4.7

Adelaide Sailing Club’s Josh Hinks maintained his stranglehold on the Laser 4.7 fleet with a dominant overall victory in the entire Tri Series regatta.

In the 22-race series he only missed out on first place on six occasions, either to Radial sailor John Gordon sailing a smaller rig size or to former 420 crew Alexander Newman.

Newman was second overall in the final standings, closely followed by Sarah Dredge in third and Darcy Fewings in fourth.

Laser Radial

After sailing in the 4.7 fleet at the first leg of the Tri Series, Adelaide Sailing Club’s John Gordon finished the remainder of the Tri Series off in the Radial rig and dominated the racing from then on, claiming a solid victory.

He was closely followed by Ceduna’s Angus Bubner, who sailed incredibly well at all Tri Series events, which was an awesome effort making the long trip every single time.

Harrison Barrett and Sarah Short both raced in the Radial at various times throughout the Tri Series and were third and fourth respectively.

420

The 420 fleet has shown solid growth this season ahead of the upcoming nationals at the Brighton and Seacliff Yacht Club and on the weekend we saw it go right down to the wire at the top of the fleet.

The teams of Alex Higgins and Joel Mackenzie and Matt Meaney and Sam Magarey have gone toe-to-toe all season and after all was said and done only one point decided the winner with Alex and Joel taking the chocolates.

The remainder of the fleet has also been highly competitive with some great performances right across the board.

Maia Schnaars and Bella Campion have been sailing well as has Alex Magarey and Josh Gomez, with the South Australian fleet expected to mix it with the best this summer at both the class nationals and the Australian Youth Championships.

29er

It was great to see two 29ers hit the water at the final leg of the Tri Series with a pair of interstate sailors in Adelaide ahead of the nationals getting in and testing their skills on the new waters.

Scott Whitehead from the Townsville Yacht Club, sailing with Sarah Short from the Adelaide Sailing Club, had a great battle with his sister Breiana Whitehead, who was sailing with Adelaide’s Harry Mitton.

They were close in all races but Scott and Sarah managed to take the win. Both Scott and Breiana were presented with a Down Under Sail Yearbook for making the effort to come over.