| Australia. 25th Pittwater and Coffs Harbour Offshore series |
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| Sunday, 01 January 2006 | |
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Nicole Amos: The Pittwater to Coffs Harbour Yacht Race and the associated series has developed into one of the most popular ocean-racing events in Australia, offering competitors major strategic challenges prior to arriving in one of Australia's most popular coastal towns. In its 25th year, this event began in 1981 as a 'warm water' race, covering 226 nautical miles of the NSW coastline, travelling north from Broken Bay in Sydney to Coffs Harbour. The event has evolved considerably since that first start on 27 December 1981. Short races now take place at both venues. This year will see two race days on the Palm Beach circle off Pittwater on 29 and 30 December 2005. Then the famous offshore passage race from Broken Bay up to Coffs Harbour on 2 January 2006. While in Coffs Harbour, crew and families enjoy the array of activities the town has to offer before taking part in two days of racing on the pristine waters around Solitary Island on 5 and 6 January culminating in the prize giving and 25th Anniversary celebrations at the Coffs Harbour Yacht Club on the Friday night. Since Arthur Bloore’s race record of just under 21 hours back in 1984, the Pittwater to Coffs Harbour Race has been held in the face of prevalent northerlies so the record was not broken until January 3 2003 by Bob Oatley’s Wild Oats IX, with its new radical canting keel. Wild Oats IX surfed to a line honours win, smashing the race record by almost two and a half hours. The current race record stands at 18hrs, 29mins and 14secs. Wild Oats XI, which has just won the Sydney to Hobart in such spectacular style, was set to return to Sydney for the 25th Anniversary Coffs Race, but the yacht which has become only the second boat in the history of the Hobart to achieve the treble of line honours and handicap victory, plus smashing the race record, broke a boom/mast attachment as it rounded Tasman Light just 40 miles from the finish. Mark Richards, skipper of both Wild Oats X and Wild Oats XI says: 'It was a struggle to get across the line and unfortunately the boat can’t go to sea for the return trip from Hobart until we’ve had a new carbon fibre part made, so we are out of time'. However, the team will be sailing north with last year’s winner, Wild Oats X, the 20 metre canting keel boat which also set the new record for the new course. Mark says they’re hoping for a fast run, and maybe to smash another record! 'See you all in Coffs Harbour', he says. While the record fleet in the 1991 10th Anniversary race was 108 boats, the popularity of the Coffs Harbour marina is now restricting fleet sizes and race organizers are faced with more entries than berths for the Silver Anniversary race. Just as the fleet has changed over the last 25 years, so have the sponsors and the event publicity. For three consecutive years two resorts in Coffs Harbour ‘Pelican Beach Resort Australis and Quality Resort Nautilus’ have sponsored the very popular Solitary Island Race and awarded winners with a weeks accommodation. This years event also brings onboard two new supporting sponsors SeaSpray Magazine one of New Zealand's longest running titles and now fully international. SeaSpray is a high quality 'coffee table' publication that surpasses even some of the most lavish international publications. While SeaSpray is sold internationally in selected and highly targeted retail outlets, it is primarily a subscription-based magazine. Along with SeaSpray is Yachtworld.com the Internet's leading online boat sales marine publication containing the largest photo database of new and used power and sailboats for sale and charter on the World Wide Web. The official event airline carrier is QantasLink who offer all crew members, family and friends of the Pittwater to Coffs Harbour Series discounted flights from Sydney to Coffs Harbour and vis versa. www.rpayc.com.au |
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| Last Updated ( Sunday, 01 January 2006 ) |
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