Gold Coast to Brisbane Great Race 2013 - A Weta point of view
by Miranda Powrie on 13 Feb 2013
Approaching a curve in the channel in the great race - Gold Coast to Brisbane Great Race Peter Schwarzel
The Great Race, a 20 mile distance race from Southport Yacht Club in the Gold Coast to Weirman creek near Brisbane was favoured with the addition of three Wetas this year. A popular local multi race for off the beach cats and dinghies it weaves up the channels of the broadwater and across Morton Bay, making for some tricky and tactical sailing, with a lot of sandbanks to avoid!
This year the breeze ranged from five to fifteen knots of mostly south easterly breezes, making for a reaching and downwind course, which took just on four hours for the Wetas, with a close battle between the single handed sailors Kevin and Greg for the lead, Kevin describes how the race went for him.
One section was a very narrow channel and the wind was right up the transom and Greg and I did jibe after jibe after jibe. Neither of us counted but is could not have been less than 50. With maybe 1/2nm to the finish I passed Greg yet again and had to continually jibe and cover Greg as he made gains in the puffy breeze. He managed to get a puff that pushed him and I had to push him until I got the breeze and then shoot for the line. The finishing margin was about 2sec. Very close racing in very testing conditions. A great race that I will certainly do again next year.
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