Skippers – if you haven’t already done so please RSVP by tomorrow to say if you are planning to sail next Sunday – our catering team needs to know numbers for your free feed at the finish line.
We still need the following…
Fingal Set up team – to put tent up and carry chairs and BBQ and tables over to the point
Timekeepers tent at finish line will be set up early sunday morning
More people on the catering team – both start & finish
Photographers – ideally to be at the start and follow the race. Tumbulgum bridge is a great spot. Photos needed at end of day. Can save on laptop at finish line
Thank you !
See you next Sunday – if you’re not sailing come and wave from the river bank!
Four more trees and lots of lomandra planted and woodchip mulch spread, which looks fantastic!
Thanks to the Tweed Shire Council for the plants and mulch.
Container emptied, all sabots rigged and checked – repair list made or done on the spot.
Rails put up to hang life jackets – with a great salvaged basket rack underneath for footwear, new large hooks for sabots mast and boom sets.
Everything cleaned and sorted.
The 27 Buzzy Bees were: Adam Hurt, Franc Krasna, Kevin Bourke, Lex Branch, Taj Krasna, Aiison Blatcher, Monique Smith, Dave Chester, Matt Colnan, Matt Andrews (+ Mia & Aiden), John Hayward, Geoff Carter, Gary McCrohon, Mark Reynolds, Adrian & Anne Colnan, Lydia Salvagno, Camille Lettieri + Otto & Ramona, Marcela Piakova + Sid Willis, Kynan Luescher, Kate Yeomans, Andrew Jaggers.
Thanks to Monique, Camille and Suzanne for cake, banana pancakes and biscuits to keep us going.
Commodore Bill Fenelon is away again at the helm of tall ship “South Passage” this week sailing from Townsville to Palm Island and then around Hinchinbrook Island. Back at the ranch, down at Fingal the sailing club races go on without him.
Corsair Rockin Robyn chasing Swell Lady
Last Sunday afternoon a zephyr light breeze blowing with a strong incoming tide almost thwarted the first race of the final day of the Winter Race Series. 15 boats, including 7 Corsairs and 4 NS14’s, lined up for the downstream start with 36 sailors on board. Race 1 saw the early lead by the Lasers eroded by the NS14’s and Corsairs on the following legs. Lex Branch on Impulse “Splitter” had a very satisfying day with a first on scratch in race 1, 10 minutes ahead of half the fleet. Mark Reynolds, Matt Andrews & Charlie Grace were next taking 1st in their class on Corsair “Keenas”.
The pink lady crew of Corsair Swell Lady.
A light breeze was no barrier to having fun on the water with the crew of Corsair “Swell Lady” dressing up in an array of pink paraphernalia to entertain the fleet when the wind died. Even wearing a pink mohawk mask, ace crew, Deborah Flannery still managed to set their pink spinnaker to great effect giving them a well-earned 3rd place in their class in the 2nd race.
Double Winner Lex Branch on Impulse Splitter.
The single-handers came back again in race 2 with the first 3 places on scratch taken by Lex Branch, (first again) and then John Pring and Kate Yeomans on Lasers. Alison Blatcher, Liz & Oliver Grace got a 2nd in the Corsairs on Melita III and a 1st in the next race with Camille Lettieri taking over from Oliver. Russ Timbs with Rave Chester & Sid Willis also had an exceptional couple of races, leading the Corsairs for a long time in race 2 but the unpredictable Tweed River wind shifts took them down to 5th. The NS14s/MG14s were also struggling – Junior Tom Busbridge put in an excellent effort with on board coach Adam Hurt on “Zazen” to take 1st in their class in race 1 and was just pipped by Dave Robinson & son Cooper in race 2. Dave & Cooper also got a 1st place on handicap – a great result for them. New members Sandie Williams & Roger Clark got some on board coaching in the second race from ace sailmaker and usual Swell Lady crew, Matt Andrews and they took 2nd in the corsair class on club boat “Rockin’ Robyn”.
Sid Willis crewing on Corsair 677 with Russ Timbs & Sleepy Rave
The Juniors put on a good show today too. Thomas Busbridge skippering NS14 Zazen and Kynan Luescher and Taj Krasna sailing a 125 for the first time. Taj & Kynan were so impressed with having a spinnaker to play with that they made the most of a the wind when it arrived and sailed passed the course mark and on up the river. The tide beat them trying to get back – our kind safety boat driver gave them a tow. These two 11 year olds likely won’t be crewing on the seniors boats in races anymore now they’ve proved themselves capable of handling their own boat, the river is theirs! The day finished with the usual sausage sizzle and plenty of time to sit around and chat. Our safety boat drivers and timekeepers were Bryan & Muriel Townsend, Geoff Carter, Suzanne Blatcher and Marcela Piackova. If you would like to join this friendly support team do get in touch – training given. If you would like to get involved with the sailing club, on or off the water please get in touch.
Taj and Kynan rounding the bottom mark in the 125.
Our next event is the 5th annual marathon “Tumbulgum Passage Race” from Condong to Fingal Head on Sunday the 26th of August. Open to all entrants who can fit under the Tumbulgum Bridge! Following the race from the river bank makes for a perfect day out. Starting at Condong about 10am with breakfast available from 8am at Clarrie Purnell Park. Bring your camera, best photo emailed in after the race gets a TVSC T-shirt !
This is our main event of the year – all our visitors agree it’s well worth the trip.
The race starts near the Condong sugar mill and winds its way down to Tumbulgum and on to Chinderah and the finish at Cave Point in Fingal Head – the scenery along the way will make it hard to concentrate on sailing! It’s an excellent day out for spectators too – lots of cafes and watering holes at Tumbulgum, Chinderah and Fingal and great spots to view the boats go by.
Please get your Entry forms in asap – no payment required until race day. Class numbers will be taken from preregistrations (needed for prize ordering)
2018 Tumbulgum Passage Race Polo Shirts $25 & T-shirts $15
Pre-orders & payments needed by Friday the 3rd Aug at the latest – will be ready to pick up on Race day.
Perfect conditions were experienced by the fleet racing in the Tweed Valley Sailing Club’s Race 5 of the 2018 Winter Point score Series.
Racing followed a different format this week, with three short sprint races replacing the usual one long race.
Exciting start for Race 2.
This meant a lot more work for our timekeeper, Suzanne Blatcher, but kept the action closer to the spectators, for those watching from shore.
Another big fleet got involved, with 16 boats and 34 crew, split into 3 main divisions, single handed: Lasers and Impulses, two handed 14ft NS14’, and three handed 16ft Corsairs.
Dave getting his lean on in the morning.
One multihull joined the races Hobie 16, “Sledger” (Dave Chester and Rigby Andrews and was able to complete each race in just over 15 minutes, while the closest monohull was 3 minutes behind.
Keenas during Race 2.
Corsairs were the biggest fleet with 7 boats and 22 crew competing. Fastest today over 3 races was “Swell Lady” (Monique Smith, Matt Andrews & Deb Flannery) winning two races, and second was “Keenas” (Mark Reynolds, Taj Krasna & Craig Foley) , and third was Minnow (Bill Fenelon and a whole bunch of kids).
It was a good fleet of these one design boats with two crews in new boats having they’re first race.
New Members Scott and Debbie Jones racing with their daughters on their new Corsair, Nimbus.
In the NS14, two new boats competed and both boats show good boat speed and kept up with the leaders.
Peter on his Laser in the lead at the start of Race 2. Kate not far behind!
Fastest today was Single Handed Laser “Bluey” (Kate Yeomans). Kate has only been sailing for a few season but is winning everywhere she goes at the moment. Today Kate scored first finisher in 2 races and second in the other.
Second in the single handers was Impulse “Rosie” (Adam Hurt) and third was another impulse “Splitter” (Lex Branch)
Sid on the helm of a club X3, enjoying the winter sun.
Juniors and Adult Learn to Sail was held in the morning in fairly light conditions.
Michael and Liz Grace from Banora on their third lesson with TVSC and loving it.
Commodore Bill Fenelon is at the helm of tall ship “South Passage” this week sailing from Cairns so two of our younger sailors have taken over the report writing task.
17 boats raced this week with 34 people sailing in race 3 of the TVSC Winter Series at Fingal. Breeze was 7 – 15 south easterly which meant an upstream start. The Lasers, missing trophy winners Gary McCrohon and John Hayward, were led by Peter Fell the whole race. Peter Redmond kept a frustrating few seconds ahead of Mauri Meyer with Mauri getting it down to a 2 second gap at the finish line. Peter Fell took 1st on Yardstick time corrected results with Kate Yeomans on a Laser 4.7 second and Monique Smith on Corsair Swell Lady up with the leaders again at 3rd.
Geoffrey and Kynan.
The 7 Corsairs were quite spread out after Swell Lady with Daniel Sieders and Marg Walgers on “Odin” only a minute and a half behind but the next finisher was a whole 6 minutes later. Corsair “Capers” with Mick Okeefe, Jana McGeachy & Kirby Edwards brought up the rear of the fleet but still did well beating NS14 skippers Andrew Jaggers & Mark Banbury on yardstick.
Peter on his Laser with Robert on his NS14, with Tara crewing.
Tara Beth (Burringbar) has recently returned from a womens coaching weekend in Townsville with Olympic bound sailor Shelley White. As a relative beginner she was keen to try out her new skills crewing with Robert Preston on the club’s new NS14 “Impulsive Max”. She was pleased with their result – 7th across the line and 1st in the NS14 class – and is looking forward to getting more racing experience with the club’s varied fleet.
The heroes of the day were juniors Taj Krasna and Aron Colwill who got the chance to sail in their first race on the club’s X3. You can read their reports of the experience below. Sid Willis filled in for Taj’s usual crew spot crewing on the adults boats –with Corsair “Keenas” and Kynan Luescher and Nina Colwill on Corsair “Melita III”
Taj Krasna with crew Aron Colwill on X3 Heron
Taj Krasna skippered his first race last Sunday on X3 “Heron” with crew member Aron Colwill. Taj and Aron set off on a cautious start but soon picked up pace. On the second lap they had a malfunction to the centreboard rubber, sending Taj overboard. He had a bit of a swim back to the capsized boat. They shivered their way back to shore, accompanied by a pair of dolphins, also out for a fun time! All in all it was a pretty good day! (Taj Krasna – Fingal Head)
This was my first experience as a 10 yr old sailing a boat with Taj an 11 yr old, I felt really excited and cold. Taj fell off the boat and I knew I was going to capsize if I turned around to pick him up, but I still did so. The water felt freezing. I waited with the boat whilst Taj swam back. He had lost his water bottle and his cap. I got up on the centreboard to pull the boat upright. But we were facing the wrong direction so we got the safety boat to pull us around. My sister Nina 12 was helping on the safety boat. Finally I got the boat upright with help from Taj. We went back in, having completed two laps, to get warm and dry. One of the other sailors retrieved Taj’s cap and returned it to him and he was very grateful. We are planning to do it again soon, without the capsize next time! (Aron Colwill – Uki)
Mike & Imogen Mansted on Tasar Hippo
Next race Sunday 8 July midday briefing and crew allocation at Fingal Boat ramp. Come down and join the timekeeping team in the spectators’ tent and see if Mauri can get ahead of the two Peters next time.
If you would like to get involved on or off the water email tvscmail@gmail.com or call Alison 0434 982 922.
Last Saturday night the Tweed Valley Sailing Cub (TVSC) celebrated its 7th season of sailing on the Tweed River, with its Annual Trophy Presentation Dinner.
80 members, and friends, including 18 junior sailors, enjoyed the evening hosted by the Kingcliff Beach Bowls Club, who have supported the TVSC now for the second year.
The TVSC’s top award, the “Summer Point Score Trophy”, includes every class of sailing boat, in a 10 race handicap series throughout summer, usually conducted fortnightly.
A total of 87 people participated in racing this summer in a fleet of 34 boats.
This year’s top award was won by Kate Yeomans, sailing an Olympic Class Laser. This was Kates 2nd season in the Laser and her performances have been improving markedly each race. With a helpful group of Laser “Great Grand Masters” to point her in the right direction, combined with a tenacious will to win and never give up, Kate sailed extremely well and is a deserving winner of the club’s top trophy. Second in the point score was Laser Sailor, Gary McCrohan, and third was shared by Alison Blatcher and Junior sailor, Taj Krasna.
TVSC concurrently conduct three “One Design” Class Championship Series over summer, which are scratch races. (No Handicapping) and a Multihull division based on boat yardsticks. There are 5 races is these series’, one race per month.
The Clubs biggest one design Class fleet, the Australian 16ft. 3 handed “Corsair” Class, included 15 boats with 45 crew sailing. Most of these boats use spinnakers and racing is very close and hard fought. The series wasn’t decided till the final windward leg of the last race.
Winning the Corsair Class Championship this year was Team “Odin” Corsair 388 (Daniel Sieders, Adrian Dokter and Tamara Sheppard), 2nd was “Swell Lady” (Monique Smith, Matt Andrews and Deb Flannery) and 3rd was “Minnow”, (Bill Fenelon, Jessie Normand and Max Hennessey) 4th was “Keenas”, joint 5th place went to “Melita 3” and “Epic”.
Division 2, 14ft 2 handed division, for NS14, Tasers and MG14’s was contested by 7 boats and 14 crew. Winning this division in NS14 Tornado was Bill Fenelon & Taj Krasna, 2nd NS14 Radical Phase, (Glen Slight & Kynan Luescher) and 3rd place was NS14 Zarzan (Adam Hurt & Tom Busbridge) 4th place went to Tasar “Hippocampus” and 5th place was Blu Tack.
Division 3 Single Handers, Olympic Class Lasers, 1st place for the 3rd year in a row, Laser “Great Grand Master”, Gary McCrohan. Next placed Laser, coming second with a fantastic result, Kate Yeomans, and third was another “Great Grand Master”, John Heywood.
Division 4 Multihulls Yardstick based point score was won again by TVSC Vice Commode, Dave Chester, with crew Isaac Poulsen, in a Hobie 16. Dave usually finishes miles in front of the mono hull fleet and tries to see how many he can lap!!! 2nd in the Multihulls was Weta “Scored a Try” (John and Saffron Cook) and 3rd was Mari Cat “Osprey” (Glenn Slight)
Juniors sailing is alive and strong on the Tweed River.
17 Junior sailors attended the presentation. Juniors have their own sailing in the morning and then join the crews in the afternoon races. Juniors points are earned the same as the adults. By winning races, and this years “top gun” Junior sailor (Taj Krasna) won third place in the summer point score.
1st Placed Junior Taj Krasna, with Commodore Bill Fenelon and Vice Commodore Dave Chester
Winter sailing is now underway, with 2 races already completed and race three to be conducted this weekend at Fingal Head.
Spectators are very welcome at sailing events, to join in at the spectator’s tent at Fingal head, or to enjoy anywhere on the grassy foreshore of the Fingal Reach.
Taj Krasna & Kynan Luescher on TVSC’s New Manly Junior
Volunteers are always welcome and appreciated. Support teams help with rescue boats and time keeping. New sailors and experienced sailors are always very welcome.
If you would like to volunteer as support crew, please phone Bill Fenelon (TVSC Commodore) 0411 123 405
15 boats carrying 34 crew turned up to race on Sunday but after viewing the cold and rough conditions on the river, some boats were to remain dry on their trailers, as the clubs Lasers “Great Grand Masters” (over 65 YO’s) elected to stay dry and watch from the spectator’s tent.
The Commodore on Minnow.
Gusty and difficult conditions, with a strong ebbing tide combining with a 25 knot Southerly made for a challenging afternoon sailing on the Tweed River, with only half the fleet completing the course. Many boats capsized and the water was cold.
A slightly wet Black Duck.
12 boats started the race and only 6 boats finished, as the challenging conditions wore the fleet down.
Perennial winner, Dave “Chest bond” Chester, on his Hobie 16, and sailing new crew, Sid Willis, got back in his usual position in the front of the fleet, lapping everybody and getting home 24 minutes ahead of the first mono hull. Dave likes to be in front!!! and measures his success by how many boats he can lap, and so was very happy with today’s performance.
Black Duck and Minnow
Back in the real race, (the monohull fleet) first to finish was single-handed Laser “Black Duck”, sailed by Grand Master (or rather, Mistress!) Kate Yeoman, getting the gun from 2nd placed monohull, Corsair “Minnow” by 20 seconds. It was a typical tenacious effort for Kate who once worked in the NT as a crocodile wrangler. Kate never gives up and came from behind to take the lead in the final lap as the two leading monohulls crossed tacks and change positions several times in a battle to the finish. No more than 30 seconds separated these two boats the entire race.
Kate on the winning Black Duck.
Again, the Corsairs were the dominating Class with 6 of these Classic Aussie 16ft three handed boats competing and all setting spinnakers. It was a good day for the crew on “Minnow” (Bill Fenelon, Kynan Luescher, Miles Browne and Scott Jones). Always a front runner in the stronger breezes, and this week sailing with 4 crew, lead the entire fleet for the first two laps and won the Corsair class.
Keenas…mustard!
3rd boat to finish and second Corsair was “Keenas” (Craig Foley, Mark Reynolds and Taj Krasna.) The Keenas boys were always in the hunt and are definitely the major improvers in the Corsairs. Eventually finishing 3 minutes behind Minnow after a brief disaster when Mark went for a quick swim.
Mark tests the water temperature.
Next to get home and in an unfamiliar position 7 minutes back, was Club Champion Corsair “Swell Lady” Monique Smith, Matt Andrews and Deb Flannery), after also suffering a minor disaster, dropping their spinnaker into the water (which is like a giant and very effective sea anchor and caused an explosion of loud sailor talk on the boat!!!). Until this mishap, it was business as usual on Swell Lady and they fought a very close battle for the lead with Minnow. They never recovered their position following this disaster but did manage to sail on and finish after completely re rigging their spinnaker while sailing up the beat to windward.
Swell Lady
Another Corsair has joined our fleet, sailed by Peter Ross, Mark Storrier & Roger Clark, making a total of 15 of these boats registered to race with the club.
NS14 Impulsive Max
Three boats competed in the two handed 14ft class, which featured a new Club owned boat, NS14 “Impulsive Max” kindly donated by the South Brisbane Sailing Club. This boat sailed its first race with the club, crewed by Robert Preston and Racheal O’Hagan. It was hard work in the 14ft division with many capsizes. Impulsive Max was first home in this class and followed by another club NS14 Blu Tack sailed by Andrew Jaggers and Matt Colnan.
TVSC Junior Taj on the helm of Keenas
Juniors sailing is growing strongly on the Tweed with large group coming down each weekend and learning the skills. Juniors sail in the morning on small boats, then double up as crew on the racing boats in the afternoons.
Many thanks to our shore-based support team that make racing possible. Suzanne Blatcher (Head Time Keeper) assisted by Barry Callanan and Sandy Williams, and our rescue boat team, skipper Bryan Townsend and crew Adrian Colnan.
Next Race on the Fingal Reach will be on the 24th of June.
New sailors are always welcome and experienced is not required to crew.
Rescue boat drivers and crew are needed, you need a NSW Boating licence, or crew in the rescue boat and log your time towards a licence.
For any enquiries, please phone Bill Fenelon on 0411 123 405.
