They established themselves as a team to beat from day one and now Heath Walters and his crew on Mako-Melges are proudly wearing the coveted “Bundy Blue” Henri Lloyd jackets after winning the Bundaberg Sports Boats Championship at Skandia Geelong Week.
The winning team comprised Walters, his brother Murray, John Sariano, Rob Brewer, and “tactictian and inspiration” 14 year old James Brewer, a talented sailor who was recently selected to race at the Optimist Worlds in Brazil later this year. “James is our “everywhere man,” he calls the pressure for us and he’s great at looking ahead” said Walters.
“He’s in charge of speed on the boat and he loves to rev us up when he feels the boat’s not going as fast as he thinks it should.” James’ dad Rob joked that he just came along for the ride saying “They actually asked James to sail the regatta and he asked if he could bring along his Dad!”
The exciting rides have inspired James to put his hand up for a Melges 24 in coming years. “They’re heaps faster than Opti’s” he said “great fun to sail on.” Walters, who builds Melges 24’s at North South Yachting in Gosford said, well he can join the queue, there are 15 already in Australia with plenty of inquiries for more.”
Run in conjunction with the Australian Sports Boat Association National Championship, the Skandia Geelong Week sports boat fleet contested 8 races over three days using a measurement-based handicap system. The SMS system, developed by the Australian Sports Boat Association has been attracting attention from similar clubs around the world and proved its worth again at this regatta. Heading into the final day of racing with a significant lead, all the Mako-Melges team had to do was maintain their high standard to secure the championships.
Conditions varied from little wind to more than enough and on-course carnage was rife. Three broken masts in an original starting fleet of 22 boats resulted in the retirement of MJR Outrage and the two South Australian entries; Game Over and Bohica. Noel Leigh-Smith’s Bethwaite 8 Vivace led the group around the course, taking line honours in all eight races.
First race on the final day began in an 8 knot breeze with Thomson 8 Zippier proving to be as good as her name. Second behind Zippier on corrected time was Thompson 7 Salsa Lou, a former winning boat at Geelong, now renamed by owner John Lloyd and steered by Cameron Williams, a multiple Skandia Geelong Week sports boat title winner. Third on handicap was Heath Townsend from Western Australia with his Melges 24 OD What Tha.
Once the sea breeze kicked in at 2pm the fleet enjoyed slightly more challenging conditions in a 12-15 knot southerly for the second race. The Works, an Elliot 770, was forced to retire with yet another broken mast but everyone else enjoyed a nice fast ride. Some cautious kite drops stole valuable seconds from some otherwise fast runs and once again Mako-Melges finished first, followed by Qantum Sails and Salsa Lou third.
Further dramas unfolded during the final race of the series when the two Delphia sport 24’s, Splash 1 and Splash 2 ran into trouble, retiring with a broken mast and a broken rudder respectively. The solid breeze produced some exciting downwind action which suited Quantum Sails this time around, less than a minute ahead of Bendigo Private and Ronstan Ray White with their first top three placing at the regatta.
Final Series Results show Mako Melges with 14.00, Salsa Lou 2400 and Quantum Sails 29.50
With their worst result an equal fourth in race three of the series, the Mako-Melges team can be justly proud of their consistent efforts in a very competitive field.
“The beauty of this regatta is that it’s been a bit of everything” said Walters “it was a whole bunch of boats finishing very close together on handicap. This is our third year and I’ve been eyeing off those Blue jackets for a while so it’s really great to get the win.”
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