Race Report - Saturday 18 January 2025

Autumn Point Score, Races 3 & 4

Photos by John Sweeny and Richard McLachlan

PRO David Airey reports:

Saturday dawned with strong winds gusting to 40 knots, and it looked like the PRO's job was going to be to cancel the racing. However, on arriving at the club the wind had abated, and we set the course in steady winds from the south at less than 15 knots. At the briefing I suggested that the winds were less than the forecast 20-25 knots and it would be pleasant sailing.

Once we anchored the Jazzman, the sky cleared and the wind picked up to a challenging 15 to 25 knot gusty southerly that continued throughout the racing. Initially, 31 sailors made it to the start of the first race, but multiple capsizes were order of the day with many not making it to the end of that race. The conditions were mastered by Sylvie Stannage in the Radials and Dave Newman in the Standards who each led from start to finish in both races. Point Score winners were Roberto Blum in both races in the Radials and Dave Newman in both races in the Standards but in a tie with Yves Stenning in the first race.

Thanks to the on-water team of Justin Davey on the Jazzman and John Sweeny, Robert Bruce, Richard McLachlan and Lucy who crewed the RIBs and ensured all returned safely to shore with war stories to tell.

Harbour Marathon - 90 Years of 18 Footers in Double Bay

On Saturday 1 February 2025 DBSC Laser sailors are invited to help celebrate 90 years of 18-Footer Skiffs in Double Bay. The 90th Anniversary Harbour Marathon is going to be a day full of excitement, history, and incredible competition.
Register Now and be part of this historic event!

ILCA Lasers will have a small craft start and the winners calculated on yardstick.

What’s in Store?

• Epic Race Around Sydney Harbour starting 2pm: Join us for a thrilling marathon on one of the world’s most iconic harbours. All skiff classes are welcome! (and Lasers!)

• $5,000 Prize Money

• Food, Drinks, & Live Music: After the race, enjoy delicious food, cold drinks, and live tunes by the water at Double Bay.

A day for sailors, past and present, as well as our incredible supporters, to come together and make history as we celebrate it. Whether you’re racing or soaking in the atmosphere, it’s an event you won’t want to miss!

More details and NOR and SI to be available shortly on the 18 Footers Website Here

WHAT'S GOING ON

2025 NSW & ACT State Masters - Lake MacQuarie

• February 1st & 2nd at South Lake Macquarie ASC at Sunshine, NSW

• Notice of Race

• Entry

CLub Look-ahead Schedule

• Wednesday 22 January: Twilight Sailing (5:00pm-ish splash, sailing ‘til 7:00pm)

  • Wednesday Masters Squad Training for those who have signed up (4:30-9pm)

• Thursday 23 January Twilight Racing starts again: (5pm splash, Racing 5:30pm to 7:30pm)

  • CLICK HERE to Book for the Thursday Coaching

• Saturday 25 January: Sprint Racing (1:00pm briefing, 2:00pm warning)

  • Sprints due to the Australia Day Weekend

• Wednesday 29 January: Twilight Sailing (5:00pm-ish splash, sailing ‘til 7:00pm)

  • Wednesday Masters Squad Training for those who have signed up (4:30-9pm)

• Thursday 30 January: Twilight Racing (5pm splash, Racing 5:30pm to 7:30pm)

• Saturday 1 February: Harbour Marathon - 90 Years of 18 Footers

  • Laser start times to come later in the week when the NOR and SI’s are published

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Thank you to the members who are sending through information for the newsletter. If you have content for the newsletter, please email it to newsletter@dbsc.com.au by Monday evening.

View all racing results here.
The club’s calendar can be viewed and subscribed to here.
Make a tax deductible donation to DBSC here.

Race Report - Saturday 11 January 2025

All photos by Steven London

Autumn Point Score, Races 1 & 2

Steven London (PRO) Reports:

After initial Sydney forecast of “possible thunderstorms” about 30 sailors were excited to find a sun-drenched Harbour, with clouds both offshore and over the West causing the East-Nor-East 10-15knt breeze to shift from left to right. Our course was laid with precision as ENE by CotD Murray Stone, LtraR Tim Heath, and Co-CotD Jeremy Vives, with the top mark South of Shark Island, the bottom mark in Double Bay (off Clark Island), leaving the wing mark just out of the shipping channel, which had plenty of room for the 15:00 incoming Tanker to pass Bradley’s Head without effecting our course. (Now that the KFC clear water mark has been removed).

Both Radial and Standard fleets were well behaved with clear starts all round, helped by the incoming tide. The top mark off shark island, had the course divided into NE shifts and East shifts bending around the island at times, picking the wrong side of the course or accepting a knock for too long could ruin your day! Stellar performances by Scott Hunter who was first to the finish both races in the Radials, and Connor Kellett taking both in the Standards! Some great performances and mini-battles especially as they approached the finish.

Winners on handicap are:

Race 1
Radial: Quinn Pierson
Standard: Stephen Reid

Race 2 
Radial: David Airey
Standard: Stephen Reid

Thank you to Monday's Ramp Volunteers!

On behalf of the club, I would like to extend my thanks and appreciation to the group of key volunteers who gave up their time last Monday (and on other occasions over the season) to carry out some overdue safety cleaning of the Ramps and Northern deck stairs, and generally helping to keep the club and workshop tidy:

Pat Levy, John Vasey, Peter Collie, Jim Dounis.

The moss is growing very quickly this season on the new ramps, and they need regular maintenance. Many pieces of rocks, glass and oysters were removed from the ramps, beach and stairs at low tide, after being exposed by the recent rain events which has move the sand around.

If you see hazards around the club, let us know - better still - arrange for the hazard to be resolved with other volunteers.

Thank you, The Commodore.

DBSC sailors excel at the ILCA 2025 Nationals

All photos courtesy RQYS

James Tudball reports:

Twenty-two DBSC members recently competed at the 2025 Oceania & AUS ILCA Open & Youth Championships, held at Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron on the 1st - 8th January. There were very strong fleets (in terms of quality and quantity) across all three rigs, indicating that Laser sailing is alive and well in Australia.

There was a fleet of 92 ILCA 4’s and a fleet of 85 ILCA 6’s, meaning these two classes were separated into separate flights, culminating in a Finals series with gold and silver fleets.  The ILCA 7’s had a smaller fleet of 46 boats, but there were certainly no slouches in that fleet.  As John Sweeny, one of our ILCA 7 sailors remarked, 'The Nationals were very educational!  It was good to dust the cobwebs off and see how fast the pros can sail these boats!'. Conditions-wise, it was a moderate to windy regatta, with lots of hiking (and no lay day to recover!).  It started to lighten off towards the end, but it was a physically demanding regatta overall.

Congratulations to all DBSC sailors (and the parent pit crews) who completed the regatta.  There were many fantastic on-water results. 

Also, a thank you to Zac West and Ellen Juhasz who worked as coaches for our DBSC Reach Youth sailors.

We look forward to hearing more regatta tales from you all back at the club soon!

OVERALL RESULTS FOR DBSC MEMBERS 

ILCA 4
Gold Fleet
9th  Raph McLachlan
16th  Ben Costandi
32nd  Harriet McLachlan
35th  Tucker McKeon
43rd  Elouise Morgan
46th  Charlotte Jenkins
Silver Fleet
1st  Olivia Aitken
3rd  Zoe Allen
39th Lucy Balderstone

ILCA 6
Gold Fleet
7th  Healy Ryan (and 1st U17)
37th Sara Bruce
Silver Fleet
12th  Jack Restuccia
14th  Miles Greenwood
30th  Daniel Leupen

ILCA 7
6th  Finn Alexander
8th  Campbell Patton
12th  Daniel Coastandi
13th Zander Bijkerk
16th  Julian Taylor
23rd  Hamish Crabb
27th  Conor Kellett
31st  John Sweeny

CLICK HERE for the full results sheets

Volunteers Needed

Each week OneMeal (a not-for-profit community organisation that’s 100% volunteers) provides nutritious meals, amongst other things, to people in need. OneMeal provides thousands of meals to people in-need. Most of the food we provide is cooked by Nagi’s team of cooks at Recipetineats.

OneMeal’s City service has a hot food service where we provide hot meals on Saturday and Sunday early evening at Green Park, Darlinghurst (opposite St Vincent’s Hospital), and Ward Park, Surry Hills. Our patrons at Green Park are mainly people who live rough while Ward Park patrons are primarily from the Housing Commission flats.

We are desperately in need of volunteers for Saturday/Sunday nights and volunteering can last 1-2 hours on Saturday and Sunday starting around 6pm. There is no mandated minimum time or commitment that you would need to make as any time you can provide is appreciated. You only need your volunteer Working with Children certification, which many DBSC members already have. If you are interested to know more about our City Service, please call me (Justin – OneMeal City Service Coordinator) on 0403 763 305. You can also visit our website for more information.

Justin Davey

WHAT'S GOING ON

2025 NSW & ACT State Masters - Lake MacQuarie

• February 1st & 2nd at South Lake Macquarie ASC at Sunshine, NSW

• Notice of Race

• Entry

CLub Look-ahead Schedule

• Wednesday 15 January: Twilight Sailing (5:00pm-ish splash, sailing ‘til 7:00pm)

  • Wednesday Masters Squad Training for those who have signed up (4:30-9pm)

• Thursday 16 January Twilight Racing starts again: (5pm splash, Racing 5:30pm to 7:30pm)

  • CLICK HERE to Book for the Thursday Coaching

• Saturday 18 January

  • Autumn Point Score Races 3 & 4 (1:00pm briefing, 2:00pm warning)

• Wednesday 22 January: Twilight Sailing (5:00pm-ish splash, sailing ‘til 7:00pm)

  • Wednesday Masters Squad Training for those who have signed up (4:30-9pm)

• Thursday 23 January: Twilight Racing (5pm splash, Racing 5:30pm to 7:30pm)

• Saturday 25 January: Sprint Racing (1:00pm briefing, 2:00pm warning)

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Thank you to the members who are sending through information for the newsletter. If you have content for the newsletter, please email it to newsletter@dbsc.com.au by Monday evening.

View all racing results here.
The club’s calendar can be viewed and subscribed to here.
Make a tax deductible donation to DBSC here.

Race Report - Saturday 4 January 2025

All photos by Andrew Simpson

Sprint Racing

With a good few boats away in Queensland at the Australian Open and Youth Nationals, the first weekend of sailing in 2025 was sprints, and Sydney Harbour put on a sparkling Nor’Easter day. A 12 -15kt breeze had already filled in by the time the course was set, with the promise of it building throughout the afternoon. Course length was set for around 20 minutes each to ensure everyone would have a good a workout and blow away those festive cobwebs.

DBSC seemed to be the only club running races, and competitors were slow to arrive at the Club, but by the briefing numbers had swelled to around 25, split between Full Rigs, Radials and the four or so 4.7’s. Racing comprised the standard 2 lap windward/ leeward courses with a 3 minute start sequence, and as predicted the wind steadily built to around 20 – 25k by the time we had run the 5th race. The run-out tide ensured for bouncy up-winds, but plenty of waves downwind, with a quiet harbour meant the washing machine was switched off leaving the wind to do its work.

The right-hand side of the course paid for the first couple of races with Mike Dunne and Alistair Sutherland taking out the honours in the full and radial rigs respectively. After that Craig Shears, Tim Heath, Martin White and Scott Hunter all featured on the podium.

Numbers were depleted for the last race with the 20kt NE and the run-out tide taking its toll, with the 2 on-water RIBs kept busy throughout the day. There were lots of tired, smiling faces on shore at the end of the day, with Sydney Harbour putting on its best to greet 2025.

Thanks to David Huber (LTRaR), Mark Dagworthy (COTD) and Michelle Power (CoCOTD) for their assistance.

- Andrew Simpson, PRO

Thursday Twilight Racing Resumes

Photo by Steve London

Thursday Twilight Racing Returns next week!

Our Thursday Twilight Racing returns next Thursday 16th January and will run each week until 27th March. 5pm splash for a 5:30pm start.

We also have our (optional) Thursday Twilight Coaching Program running as part of this activity. CLICK HERE for further details and to book the coaching component.

Our Thursday Twilight Racing is always a case of 'the more the merrier'.