CSC@Besar Regatta 2019 (Day 1)

Crystal clear waters and a gentle South-Westerly breeze greeted sailors this morning, an encouraging start to day 1 of the Series racing at Pulau Besar.

With the recent winds still uncertain, race committee played it cautious with the course, displaying a pennant 1 for both the IRC and PY classes. Pennant 1 takes sailors around Besar and its adjacent islands (Tengah & Hujong), the smallest round-island course available for pickings.

Yachts were taken on a beam reach right off the start, with Shardana taken an early lead over their only IRC rival, Rainbow Dream. A limited sail wardrobe meant the former found it hard to extend her lead over Rainbow Dream throughout the course, with the latter taking advantage of their limitations to briefly take the lead on the downwind stretch. Despite crossing the line first, Shardana relinquished their victory to Rainbow Dream after corrected time, failing to put enough time between them.

In the PY Class, Minx capitalized on a good start to take an early lead, sticking with the IRC sailors for a good amount of time. She continued on her fine run from the previous day’s victory, eventually taking both line honours and handicap victory in the PY Class, well ahead of close rivals Southern Light and Windancer. Limited by the lack of crew and no spinnaker, Defiance found it hard to close the gap with the fleet – but almost successfully pulled off an overtaking manoeuvre on Windancer during the final leg. Unfortunately they finished just outside of podium placing after corrected time. Separated by a mere 40 seconds after handicap, Windancer emerged the better of the two, taking 1st-runner up ahead of Southern Light. The latter struggled with a wild spinnaker for a brief period, due to an uncooperative shackle.

That wraps up day 1, we look forward to more exciting racing tomorrow!

IRC Day 1 Besar 2019

PY Day 1 Besar 2019