Day 6 Report: The last day started off as normal with a skipper briefing and their was a lot of excitement in the room.
The format of the day was to finish off two more Round Robins. The conditions on the day were quite varied with 3 to 10 knots of breeze.
The team got off to a strong start with a win off the bat against Argentina. But more importantly, after a long debriefing yesterday we ironed out our spinnaker mistakes and converted a win.
Next up we were against Italy which ended up being the team who won silver. This race proved to be the best with six or seven lead changes but unfortunately a red flag on the finish line cost us the race.
Next up was Ireland, who were David’s main rivals at the event. We managed to step up for these races and won all three against them. All races were decided on the finish line in the final few meters.
Unfortunately, after that race the wind dropped off and the priority became boat handling over tactics.
This proved to be frustrating as although we put ourselves in the best tactical positions, we were simply out sailed against experienced crews who know the boats better.
Overall, the trip was a major success. The team achieved seven wins out of 18 races (39%). Considering we never sailed Sonars before or team raced with spinnakers, not to mention the several rule adaptations that were made, I think we did remarkably well.
As a group, we tried are upmost and are very proud of or effort. It was probably shown by the amount of events we have been invited to and the compliments we received from both competitors and umpires.
Everyone on the trip truly will remember this experience and will hope to do it again.
This event would simply not be possible to our team with the SSCBC support.
We would really like to thank our SSCBC Selection Committee comprising Andrew Plympton AM, Vice Commodore Drew Marget and Adam Hawkins. Thanks also to Rear Commodore and Club Captain Scott Llewelyn, Past commodore Richard Hurley, Ben Fels and Phil Hall.
Our support from Club Members who donated boats, time and energy was very much appreciated. Fred Allen and Stephen Harvey were incredibly generous.
Our traveling supporters were incredible. Nicole Llewelyn arrived for the last day and ensured the team had a good breakfast and were ready to go. We were truly blessed to have our Commodore Graham Cunningham and team mum Annie Cunningham with us from the start of the day to the end. They came to our morning briefings and watched us race from the close spectator boat.
To sum up, we have appreciated the opportunity and look forward to an exciting future with this style of racing.
David White
