SSORC Day One and the Seven Islands Race

Seven Islands winners L-R Adrian Walters (Little Nico), Charles
Caskey (Perception) & Mike Gallagher (Galan)

Day one of the Sydney Short Ocean Racing Championship provided a light to moderate south-easterly under cloudy skies for the coastal passage race to Cape Bailey and return.

The TP52s racing in the joint SSORC and Ocean Pointscore races made the most of their large sail plans in the relatively flat water, with Marcus Blackmore’s Hooligan from RPAYC the first boat home in just under four hours. In the SSORC Division 1 fleet, Darryl Hodgkinson’s Victoire from CYCA claimed the IRC win from Primitive Cool (John Newbold - RMYS) and Bushranger (Gerry Hatton – RPAYC). Bushranger claimed the ORCi win and Primitive Cool was best on PHS. Soozal, Keiran Mulcahy’s King 40 from RPAYC, was the top Division 2 boat on IRC from Sail Exchange (Carl Crafoord – MHYC) and Advanced Philosophy (Peter Sorensen – MHYC). Matt Hanning’s Sydney 36 Supernova, also from MHYC, claimed the Div2 ORCi win while Sail Exchange was on top of the PHS table.

Inside Sydney Harbour, the annual Seven Islands pursuit race was shortened due to the limited breeze that still saw a large number of retirements. Adrian Walters Little Nico was quick in the light winds, leading Swish (Steven Proud) to the Clark Island finish by a fair margin and Kukukerchu (David Ross) third in Division 1. Charles Caskey’s Perception was the sole finisher in Division 2. The Seven Islands was also the first round of the Jeanneau Cup Series and the Division was won by Mike Galagher’s Galan. Macscap (Peter McClelland) was next, followed by Think Twice (Alexander Flecknoe-Brown).

The Sydney Short Ocean Racing Championship continues tomorrow with three offshore windward-leeward races.

To view the SSORC results - click here

To view the Seven Islands Race results- click here

SSORC Passage Race images by Andrea Francolini