Its been so windy and mainly just a speed regatta so far!

Overall i am 16th and tomorrow is the last day i think. see how we go – got to come top 15!

Cheers

Day 2 (today) was different to yesterday because we had a heap more wind and the fullrig rig sailors loved it. i was pretty happy with my results today because i stayed in good shape most of the time and even caught alot of boats that should have been smashing me in this wind (heavier people with an average weight of 75 – 85kgs). Im not too happy with the results so far but there is 8 races to go and a chance to either stay consistant and better my scores…  

My results so far have put me in 17th overall, at this point i cant remember my individual results from the first 4 races.

 Give me more downwinds like these and i will be off no worries lol 

Until tomoz – peace

It started out at Sail Brisbane where it was close competition for first and second between myself and international Radial Penny Clark (GBR). Penny eventually won the regatta and well done to her. Then we travelled to sydney for SIRS and then it was another close battel for either first or second place between myself and Ben Price a very close mate from Tazzy. He won SIRS and i announced that was our friendship finished from that poin onward lol (joking).

Then we moved further south to Melbourne for the nationals where i finished up 9th overall and 2nd Australian which i was happy about but i was more thrilled with coming first male overall, this qualified me for the pole position for words. Then we stayed in melbourne for SAIL Melbourne and the Asian Pacifics which i posted a 2nd and a 4th overall.

Well thats been the summer in a nutshell and today i leave for the Worlds in New Zeland and am feeing very prepared, i have checked everything of my list of things to do and get done and all is going well. Stay reading for regular updates during the regatta.

 pS. pretty annoyed to be leaving for worlds and missing out on the easter bilby regatta – it was a hard decision but i think i went the right way with worlds.

PEaCE

For the last part of the trip Ryan, Ben and I have been through Amsterdam and through Paris for a look and see how the locals spend there time and local night life, then it was onto
Singapore where they really do have a laser on there national currency! The flight we were on however from London Heathrow lost our baggage and we were left with nothing in
Singapore, so the airline gave us both $100 each to spend on essentials. We treated ourselves to a massive buffet in the hotel we were staying and we had to thank British airways for their efforts, it ended up being a fun night. The funny thing was though in the morning I received my bags, so I was happy and scored a free 100 bucks.

 

 Overall the 2 regattas that I participated in weren’t of great success and both I was reasonable disappointed with my performance in. However I learnt so many new things and lessons out of both – it may have been a bad regatta for me but it was the best regatta in terms of learning new things that will help greatly with my progression in sailing. This was the first time I had been overseas by myself and I was happy with how I delta with things also…

 

 Now im happy to be home, overseas was the most fun I have had for a while but you just cant beat home and your own bed – overall a fun and worthwhile experience overseas and worlds campaign – now it is onto nationals and New Zealand worlds in March… stay tuned

 

 Thanks for everyone’s help and support

  Peace – Klade out! 

I am quite dissapointed with my performance in this regatta, not because of the result just because i know i am way faster and better than most of them and i dont have a chance to show that i am because of a couple of stupid mistakes that shoulnt have happened and that were out of my control. Ohwell things like this happen i guess, and i will learn from it… atleast i can try to  do well silver fleet if i get my head right! yay…

 peace out

 

I will start with yesterday… we had a postponement flag up all day so we were just chilling at the yacht club and when we thought they would realise what the heck they were doing and cancel racing for the day and send us home but instead they sent us out at around 3.30pm and try to get two races in, this in theory would be crazy just coming from experience of the last weeks and how long it takes to get a fleet away with all the generals. I was in the red fleet which was the last of all 4 fleets to start, we eventually got a couple of races in and in some tricky winds and extreme amounts of tide made it very hard to stay focused especially after waiting all day doing nothing. We eventually finished the races and came in, by this time it was 9.30 at night and I pretty much threw everything on the boat, road home had something to eat and went to bed.

 

 

Today the wind picked up quite a bit and I was missing the 4 odd kilos I lost after my cold last week, that extra weight would defiantly come in handy, now I am 62.7kg but over the last week I have been eating like crazy to try and build it back up to at least what it was. I haven’t checked recently but I think I have made some success. The last couple of days I have been starting very conservatively because I don’t want to get another black flag so I have been staying a bit far back from the line and as a consequence have been getting rolled each start and getting very bad positions and always having to catch back up but to still end badly. Today would have been better but I think over the last week the regatta has been that frustrating that I was more glad to get in on time today rather than hear of my bad positions. I had had enough of getting the bad positions and it wasn’t teaching me anything so I thought just go for the start and I if I end up with another flag then so be it as long as I have learnt a greater lesson. Just when I was doing this and about to get a good start another competitor sailed over the front of my bow and pushed me back on the line just in time so that I couldn’t recover. I didn’t see him so I couldn’t protest and I didn’t have enough time to get back on the start so as a result I was deep from the start and had to catch up, I was 3^rd last around the top mark and probably caught about 20 boats or so back up but still not at all happy with the result.

 

 

Some more news is that on the spare days Ryan, Ben and I went to a sweet water park in land a little bit. It was the hottest day they have had here for a long time and everyone was out at the beach, they even ran out of the Sunday paper at the corner store there was that many people. But anyway we went to the park and had an awesome time but just as we got out of a slide we saw a big fight between a gang of black people and the police and park security. It even got to the point where blood was spilt, pepper spray in the eyes and it even got carried by the wind into us and it wasn’t good (it stung my eyes and it tasted very bad) and physical abuse by the police, it was pretty crazy.

 

 

Overall very unhappy with how im sailing right now!

 

 

Well that’s all for now – time to go to bed – yet another day of sailing tomorrow! Missing everyone ; )

 

 

Cya

One regatta down one to go… the past couple of days has been relatively normal except for the extreme amounts of time – the only bizarre thing is how competitive the whole of the gold fleet is. Everybody (60 odd boats) are in such close range throughout the whole race, there is no room to breathe lol you could go from a top 10 position back to around 40th and then back to top 10 again – it all depends on what mistakes you make. And because everyone is that close everywhere you look, it makes every mark rounding an experience in itself. Buoy room no longer means anything because nobody cares about the rules only getting around the mark less than 10-20 boats wide but most times it just ends in carnage and if you play it smart you could pick up 20 places just by avoiding them even if it means going the wrong way!

Today was my best day though, well the first race at least, throughout this regatta I have been getting crappy starts and keep getting rolled and that makes me end up back in mid fleet somewhere and forced into catching up – today however I had nothing to loose and everything to gain and so I thought I would get a good start and after a couple of generals I did just that. I was about 8th around the top mark then 4th by the bottom mark and by then finish I came 2nd!!! Things are that much easier at the front!!! And the key is just being able to get of that start and into clean air. Then my second start I was still on a high I think and didn’t concentrate and got rolled again lol I didn’t mind though – it was a little too late but it put me at 25th overall and im happy with that – considering the conditions I am happy being the 25th best radial sailor in the world lol

Now the regatta has finished and they have planned a massive party on the beach and happy hour starts in 10 minutes so I got to get going lol a very good day in the office I think!!!

Talk again soon — peace

  

(Damn media boat got in the way) 

This is gonna be really quick – i will put a more detailed one in when i am not so tired!!! Today was pretty much exactly the same as yesterday… we were on the water for another 8 and a half hours and only did one race. By now we were sposed to have about 8 races done but we have only done 4 so i think they will still split us into fleets – ryan and i will be in the gold fleet so thats good. but my result in our one race we did was so crappy!!! i got like 50 something it was impossible day though, they whole 60 boat fleet was in the space of about 20 metres of each other with tide pulling everyone together and made for absolutly impossible mark roundings. i was in an alright position and i caught back up only to be denied a spot in the last mark and about 30 boats passing me – a very frustrating day indeed and a very sunburnt one at that – only my hands thankgod!!! i dislike the decisions of this race committee alot to put it as nicely as i can. they even had soothing music playing when everyone came ashore so that everone would settle down and not be so mad… good idea!!!

 well i will elaborate more another time – cya