HONG KONG—Day-3, (Race-4) of the Hebe Haven Yacht Club Quest Yachting Typhoon Series 2015 took place on Sunday July 5 with an islands race for all boats starting in Port Shelter.
IRC-A and -B racers navigated a longer route (Course 9) taking in North Nine Pin (p), East Nine Pin (p), Basalt (p), Bluff (p), Table (s) and finishing at the Red & White Beacon. All other boats except HKPN-B covered Course 25, taking them to Bluff (s), Table (s), Bluff (p), Table (s) and finishing at Little Palm Beach. HKPN boats took Course 101 rounding Table Island (p), Bluff (p), Table (s) and finishing at Little Palm Beach.
With a 10knt Easterly wind at the 11:00am start time, Race Officer of the Day Kenny Yim judged the conditions well and set appropriate courses for all boats. For many boats the wind maintained good momentum right through the race (and at times increased to 15knts) but unfortunately for the slower boats, the wind dropped off as they were negotiating the final leg, slowing them even further. Also, because Course 9 specifies a different finish location to Courses 25 and 101 it meant setting up a second finish, out of view of the committee boat.
IRC
In IRC-A Division “FreeFire” took line honours completing the 20Nm course in 1:57:25 and claimed first place on corrected time. “Zannekin” came second, followed by “Signal 8”, and “Ambush”. Series standings show the current order to be “Zannekin” (8-points), “Signal 8” and “Straight Up” (13), “Ambush” (17) and “FreeFire” (22).
In IRC-B Division “Lighthorse” took line honours and first place on corrected time. “Sea Wolf” came second and seems to be improving as the series progresses. “Blackjack” was 3rd, “Stella” 4th and “Mojito” 5th. Series standings: “Lighthorse” (6), “Sea Wolf” (11), “Stella” (14), “Mojito” (15) and “Blackjack” (18).
“Dexter II” took line honours and 1st place on corrected time in IRC-C Division, followed by “Ding Dong”, “Whiskey Jack”, “Goddess”, and “Lady Butterfly”. “Dexter II” leads in the series with a perfect score of 4-points, “Gearbox” is on 15-points and “Goddess” has 16-points. “Ding Dong”, “Gambit” and “Moll” are the next in line.
HKPN
In HKPN-A, “Kiasu” took line honours and 1st place on corrected time. “Biits & Pieces” came second and “Scintilla” 3rd. Current series standings are “Kiasu” (9-points), “Scintilla” (11), “No One Else” (18), “Getafix” (20), and “Bits & Pieces” (21).
In HKPN-B, “Pepper & Salt” took line honours and first place on corrected time, followed by “Simplicity”, “Guerreiro”, “Elites 99” and “Windseeker”. Series standings for leading boats is currently “Windseeker” (9), “Pepper & Salt” (18), “Yilong” (19), “Eclipse” (30), and “Geko”, “Sleepy Piggy” and “Danaya” are all on 36-points. “Eclipse” missed Race-1 picking up 20-points which may be discarded as the series progresses. According to the Notice of Race, one discard is allowed after 6 or 7 Races and two discards are allowed after 8 or 9 Races.
J80
In the J80 Class, “Jive”, “Bumphead”, “Jazz”, “JeNa PaBe” and “Footloose” was the finishing order which puts both “Jazz” and “Jive” on 9-points for the Series, with “Footloose” on 10-points and “Bumphead” on 14-points.
Sportsboats
“BRACE BRACE BRACE” easily won line honours in the Sportsboat Division finishing the course in just under 2hrs 20mins, 17 minutes ahead of “Merlin” but “BRACE’s” higher rating pushed her into 2nd place behind “Merlin” on corrected time. “Merlin” is on just 4-points in the series opening up a big gap, as the next two boats, “Sidewinder” and “Black Magic” are on 11-points and 21-points respectively.
Next Races
This coming weekend on Saturday July 11 will be race day-3 of the 2015 UK Sailmaker Summer Saturday Series. The next race-day for the Quest Yachting Typhoon Series is Sunday July 19 with two geometric races planned.
