Knickerbocker Cup

Hi,

3 days have been in the Knickerbocker Cup. We going well, finishing the round robin in 3rd place in light,fickle and tricky conditions. Today they started the second stage quarter finals which is a round robin with the top 6. We have won 3 and lost 1 so far and will progress through to the Semi Final tomorrow.

We have the boats going well and are happy with how we have been sailing. We are looking forward to tomorrow and hope to progress thought to the finals and have a crack at the trophy.

Cheers for the support and if you want to follow the results closer or checkout some photos the event site is http://www.manhassetbayyc.org/.

Waka Boys

Chicago Final Day + Photos

The finals series didn’t start the way we intended them to. We were put on the back foot losing the first two matches in a first to 3 semi final against Norbjerg(DEN). We made little errors in these two races that put us behind enough to not be able catch back up. It was now do or die. We had to win 3 in a row to have a chance of racing for the championship. The third race went a little better, putting a penalty on him in the pre start and managing to get another on him at the top mark. Gaining a good lead we controlled from here. The 4th and 5th races were a lot smoother. We seemed to have found our form, nailing our time on distance to the start line and pre start manoeuvres to be able to take the two victories and move through to the final. A well fought battle by the team in high pressure situations and a well deserved spot in the Finals.

Keith Swinton our trans-tasman rival was to be our opponent. He had been sailing well all regatta and had demolished his semi final opponent Gremaldi (ARG) 3-0. We knew we were equally as good and could take this one out, so a quick motivational speech from Sam and we were into it. The wind had dropped right off now and the chop was just as big as previous days. The race committee had shortened the final to the first to win 2 due to the dying wind so we came out firing.

Race 1 we entered from starboard and lead back at to the pin end. With our time on distance spot on we won the favoured pin end forcing him to tack off to the boat. By the top mark we had tacked on him several times and had a 5 length lead. We defended this lead upwind by not giving him an inch and carried on to win the 1st race.

By the second race the wind had dropped even more down to around 4kts. With the course skewed towards the right we wanted him to be to the left of us. We started to windward and tacked off to the right hand side of the course. With tacking angles around 110 degrees we didn’t look to hot but tacking back at him for the first cross no one looked hot. We were practically pointing at each other on opposite tacks. We lee bowed him, forcing him left to the short side. A few more tacks and lee bows and we were on the port hand lay line with him tight to windward of us. We saw this as not a very strong position in the light winds approaching the top mark so we luffed him and sat head to wind until both boats had stopped . In a now strong position we bore away when he was stuck head to wind. Our timing to do this was impeccable as we gained about a 10 boat length advantage rounding the top mark. We lost a little on the downwind in some of the toughest conditions we had sailed in but maintained our lead upwind. Rounding the mark for the second time we had a comfortable lead and covered him on the downwind. He caught up a lot but we managed to hold our lead and win by two boat lengths. Score 2-0 and the first Chicago Match Race regatta going to Waka Racing.

A brilliant result that we are thrilled with. Coming from some very disappointing regattas in the middle of the year we have stepped up our professionalism on and off the water. We have all worked hard on our fitness in the last 6 weeks and have really come together as a team a lot more. The team is growing immensely and we are really starting to work well together. We are now off to New York to compete in the Knickerbocker Cup which starts in two days time and hope to back up our last performance with one equally as good. We would like to thank Stefan of Widex, Pacific Sports Community Trust, Ian of Tax Management NZ, Line 7, RNZYS, Simon from Frontend Design and the WAKA racing supporters club for all their help and generosity.

Chicago Day 2

Hi Guys,

Just a brief report as we are all off to bed.
Today we had a good day finishing the round robin equal top of the table but 2nd on count back to Keith Swinton. This meant we moved through to the quarter finals and had to race Takumi Nakamura. We sailed relly well beating him 3-1 to move through to the semi-finals tomorrow. We feel really good and are looking forward to tomorrow.

Cheers

Waka Boys

Chicago Match Cup, Day 1

Hi Supporters and friends,

Day 1 of the Chicago Match cup was a good one for Waka Racing. We started the day positively with a win against Dave Perry (USA), followed by victories against Canfield (USA) and one of the other two Kiwi teams, Laurie Jury. The breeze was straight off the Chicago waterfront making it awfully Shifty and puffs ranging from 5-20 kts. Much like a Southerly off the Westhaven wall. We sailed really well in the shifty and tricky conditions to take the victories in our first 3 races.

Our next opponent was Keith Swinton (AUS). We always have extremely exciting races against Keith and this one didn’t disappoint. We started well, tight in the leeward position to soon push him out right. The breeze then shifted right giving him the early advantage. We sailed well to stay in touch, taking two big shifts at the top to close it up and gain the right hand side. We came in on starboard lay and had a good piece of him. He proceeded to try and cross and we avoided him, clipping his back corner. This was what we thought was a clear cut penalty on him but it came our way?? The rest of the race was much the same with him slightly ahead. We gained once again and passed him right at the top. We had a great mark rounding to set him up to windward of us. He then threw a gybe at us and clipped us with his boom in the process. The penalty went on him so both slates were clear. Sailing to the finish line we were just behind him and with another big crash on the finish line and a broach from both boats he took the victory by half a boat length. We felt we sailed a great race again, to come from behind with a penalty and have a good crack at the victory.

The rest of the day was cracking. We had two more races and won them both against Nakamura(JPN) and the other Kiwi team Ruben Corbett. All in all we are very happy with the start of the regatta, sailing superbly to the conditions, changing gears in the puffs and taking the shifts like they were ours. We plan to carry this form through to tomorrow and keep the intensity and hunger up.

Cheers for the great support.

WAKA Racing

Back to Business

Hi Guys,

Thought it was about time you all deserved to hear from us and we do apologise for the lack of reports. The reason for this is that we haven’t been Match Racing since Slovenia back in June but we have kept up our sailing along with a bit of touring. We all parted ways after Slovenia to see the sites of Europe. Phil and Garth took a trip to Hungry again to do the famous ‘Blue Ribbon’ round the lake race in a Melges 24. After 16 hours and 100 miles on the board we finished in a solid 20th position out of 600. It was a sight to see off the start line(which was 5.2ks long) with 600 colourful spinnakers behind you. A month later the team meet up again in Hamble, UK to compete in the ever so popular Cowes Sailing Week. We competed in the hotly contested J109 fleet sailing some outstanding races in the challenging waters. Finishing in 8th place we were happy but would have been 5th if it wasn’t for the DNS in the last race for starting incorrectly. We have now just spent the last 9 days in Portorose, Slovenia launching a new RC44 and doing the much needed work involved to get it race ready. Hopefully all going to plan we will be able to compete in the Regatta back there in 6 weeks time.

This brings us to now. Flying to the USA tomorrow morning to continue with the Match Racing programme with 3 grade 2 regattas back to back. We have set our sights high with a big hunger to perform above ourselves. These will also be a great warm up for the boys before our second World Tour event in Denmark from the 8th-13th September. We will continue to send reports on the regattas but if you would like to follow the racing closer we will give regular updates on our site http://www.wakaracing.blogspot.com/.

Thanks again for all the support.

Waka Racing