Yachts at the Audi Hamilton Island Race Week
It’s mega budgets versus the smell of an oily rag price tag, power versus hand winches, professional crew paid a handsome daily rate and put up in accommodation by the owner versus those who have flown themselves to Race Week and are staying on boats, lulled to sleep at night with the sounds of the band performing on the main stage.
When it comes to defined roles on the boat, the big boats don’t just have tacticians anymore. These days they have a tactician and strategist, the two people who whisper in the skipper’s ear constantly feeding them information and allowing him or her to concentrate solely on their driving. One of the best in the business, Iain Murray jokes he even has someone to tie his shoes when he’s helming the Sydney based 66 footer, sailing yacht Wild Oats X.
Audi Hamilton Island Race Week Regatta
On the Whitsunday Sailing Club’s Swarbrick S111 Sandpiper, which is racing in Cruising Division 1 and happens to be the slowest in division, it’s a slightly different scenario.
Owner/skipper Colin Pruden is not only on the helm, he’s also the foredeckie. This means throwing the wheel to one of his crew before running the length of the boat to clip up the spinnaker at the bow.
“It works a treat, it has to,” says Pruden.
He draws the line at packing kites though, one of the evils of being the for’ard hand, particularly in the tropical Whitsundays when you have to go below in the sweat bath while the crew on deck enjoy the trade winds on their tanned cheeks.
Sandpiper was built in 1983 in Western Australia and has been sailed in the Whitsundays for the past 20 years by its five owners.
Pruden bought Sandpiper six years ago with this year’s Audi Hamilton Island Race Week his first with his own boat. He might be racing in the cruising division but Pruden’s still taking it seriously, stripping the boat of its heavy cruising gear for racing, “the cruising version’s at home in the garage,” he jokes.
It’s a revolving door when it comes to race crew, whoever has a day off from work comes over from Airlie Beach by ferry and jumps on the boat. A regular is Pruden’s wife Katherine, who he normally sails against in club races. For this regatta he decided it’s wiser to side with the enemy. “She’s a very good sailor, she’s very competitive though and things can become heated when we sail on different boats and against each other.”
Today’s forecast for up to 25 knot S/SE winds is just what the doctor ordered for Sandpiper. “If we can get good pressure we tonk along. It’s an older design and we can’t keep up with the modern boats upwind, they disappear.”
And there’s still the secret weapon yet to be revealed sitting on the dock. “Without giving away anything, let’s just say we hopefully have all bases covered,” warns Pruden.
The cruising fleets are enjoying their second layday while the IRC divisions and SB3s are heading out for day five of competition in the best pressure of the regatta.
