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FW Heat 3 – Botany Bay

dflanagan — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 00:29:59 +0000

NSW Formula Windsurfing Series – Heat 3

Venue: Ramsgate Beach, Botany Bay, Sydney.

Day 1:
Course was set just off the beach with the finish only 20meters out. 5 races in cross on shore (SE) conditions that started out at 18knots, but increased in every race, finishing up at 25knots. Really challenging but rewarding day for those that had their high wind gear sorted. Not really sure of the results yet because there was so much racing going on and it was hard to keep track of who was doing well.

Brett Morris had a great day in the open fleet with 4 bullets and a 2nd but only after some super close racing with Remi and Stephen Walsh. In the Free Formula David Flanagan picked up a win in the first heat and Andrew Vacopoulos had a clean sweep winning every race after that.

There was a few drama’s on the day with a couple of rigs separating from boards and Nathan Hohnberg giving us all a scare when he was thrown from his gear and couldn’t swim fast enough to retrieve it. Luckily someone in the fleet noticed him and alerted the rescue boat before the situation got too serious

Day 2 (Report to come)

Congratulations to the following sailors:

Open
1st – Brett Morris
2nd – Remi Dunoyer
3rd – Steve Walsh

Free Formula
1st – Andrew Vacopoulos
2nd – Barry Fawkes
3rd – Roger Lucas

Grand Master
1st – Wayne Bowness AUS-98
2nd – Tibor Ferenczy AUS-1
3rd – Rick Murray AUS-4

Photos:
Facebook Photos

Results:
Heat 3 Results (pdf)

Overall Standings:
Overall Standings (xlsx)

FW – Heat 2 – Results

dflanagan — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 04:59:08 +0000

Date: 20-21 Oct.

Heat 2 of the NSW Formula Windsurfing Tour was conducted on Huskisson Beach Jervis Bay on October 20-21.
Formula Windsurfing is the box rule of windsurfing. It is a development class that encourages different designs and ideas; however the majority of the products available are starting to look very similar. Boards can be up to 1005mm wide, carbon fins are 700mm’s deep and sails can be as large as 12.5M/2. These boards have a massive wind range that enables racing in very light winds from 7 knots up to 35 knots and are capable of reaching speeds of over 30 knots.

Jervis Bay provided a spectacular location for this fast and convenient format of windsurfing. Not to mention a perfect place for a family get away. Races are about 20 minutes in length and courses are usually located about 500M’s off the beach, allowing competitor’s to return to shore between races. Two divisions are started and compete on the same course allowing new comers to the class (Free Formula) to race one lap of the course, while the expert’s complete two laps.

28 competitors lined up in five races over two days of racing. Saturdays racing was held in southerly winds of up to 20 knots and four races were conducted in quick succession. Jesper Vesterstrom (DEN111) showed the fleet how to start and displayed outstanding speed to win all four races. Steve Floyd showed some early form, however it was Steve Walsh who ended the day second overall. Meanwhile the Free Formula class saw three heat winners and a dead heat at the end of day one between Andrew Vacopoulos and James Farley.

Sunday’s racing saw a Southwest breeze of 10 – 15 knots. Racing started after a short delay and gave the fleet some very tactical racing. Large holes started to appear on the course up the first work and the right paid heavily. Jesper Vesterstrom once again picked the pressure and won the race by a huge margin. Jesper won the weekends racing on 3 points, second was Steve Walsh on 9 points and Remi Dunoyer came in third after five races on 15 points.

The next event will be held at Ramsgate Beach, Botany Bay on the weekend of the 10th and 11th of November. The Free Formula division allows any windsurfers that can complete a windward leeward course to compete. Or you could even organise to borrow the club gear and give it a try.

The NSW Formula Windsurfing tour is made up of seven events, mostly weekend regattas held in family friendly and spectacular locations. The National titles will be held at Jimmy Beach in Hawkes Nest at the end of January. This event attracts some of the world’s best windsurfers due to the brilliant venue and excellent racing.

Photos can be found here. Photos(FB)

Heat 2 Results(pdf)

2012-13 Overall Results(xlsx)

FW Heat 1 – Results

Sean OBrien — Thu, 27 Sep 2012 07:05:01 +0000

NSW Formula Windsurfing Series 2012-13
Heat 1, 29-30 September
Jimmy’s Beach, Hawks Nest.
Hawks Nest proved again what a special location it is to holiday and the long weekend provided what is predicted to be a hot, dry and windy season ahead. Those of us who choose to take advantage of this beautiful location and the school holidays, headed up early to get in some much needed practice before the racing starts proper, and we were rewarded with 20+ knot NE sea breezes and flat water all week prior to the predicted mismatch of conditions for the weekend.
Saturday: After a long winter the first event of the series is always a bit of a shock to the system. Dusting off equipment or taking shinny new kit out of the bag is the usual state of affairs. Come Saturday morning we had 20+ westerly winds channeling down the beach. Luckily for us, Hawks Nest is one of the only locations we can actually race in a westerly as it is cross on shore and relatively clean and even more importantly, it was warm.
Race 1 kicked off, just as the breeze dropped to the lower end of the range, much to the delight of Steve Floyd AUS-222 who had earlier stated that the wind would not build and it was a big sail day. Steve was looking like a super star after lap 1 until the full force of the wind kicked in, rewarding the small sail contingent. Byron McIlveen AUS-747 absolutely killed it and won by a good distance with Barry Fawkes AUS-2111 cleaning up in the Free Formula division.
Race 2. The wind had now settled down to about 15knots but most of the fleet had succumbed to their smallest sails as the strength of the gusts in the first race had caught a lot of people off guard. Steve Walsh AUS-55 sailed a brilliant race for a good victory in the shifty conditions, with Remi Dunoyer and Steve Floyd making up for their DNF’s in race 1 by taking the minor places. Nathan Hohnberg AUS-11 having returned from a back injury was also on the pace with 2 x 4th. The Free Formula fleet celebrated a victory for the first time to Andrew Vecopoulos AUS-966 with Lewis Pullen AUS-80 in 2nd.
Race 3. The wind was now up to 20+ knots, but was clean i.e. not gusty. Steve Walsh, Remi and Brett Morris AUS-8 rounded the 1st mark only meters apart and locked in for a full on down-wind sleigh ride to the bottom mark, where positions were unchanged until Steve’s hand slipped off the boom, handing the lead to Remi, who had no intention of making the same mistake and muscled out a great victory. James Farley AUS-173 became the 3rd winner in 3 races in the Free Formula.
Race 4. Windiest race of the day! With the wind close to our limit of 25knots and the short but steep chop building up, this had the potential to be a test of seamanship as much as racing pedigree. Brett won in convincing style with Byron in 2nd. Nick Austin AUS-151 and Wayne Bowness AUS-98 had their best results also in the trying conditions. James Farley showed a clean pair of heals to clock up 2 bullets in a row.
After a quick pack up it was off to watch the Sydney Swans give Hawthorn a lesson of how to play AFL. Under dog victories are always sweet…….
Sunday. Sunny with 15mins of 12knots winds every 15mins. This is the perfect scenario for a family day at the beach with lots of family/girlfriend time combined with some windsurfing when the wind came in. Unfortunately it is not ideal conditions to run racing, as every time a race was started, it faded during the race. This resulted in a series of cancellations. One had to feel for Tibor Ferenczy AUS-1, who was rebelling in every race, only to be robbed each time as the wind such off to zero again. Eventually racing was called for the day and a repeat performance of packing up as quickly as possible so we could head off to watch the Rugby League final.

With 4 winners from 4 races in the open and 3 winners from 4 races in the Free Formula, it is obvious that we are in for a competitive season. Congratulations to Brett Morris and James Farley for winning their respective divisions.
Thanks to the new race committee who managed to pull together our first event, and also our guest Race Officer (Jesper Vesterstrom DEN-111) who really made the most of the crazy conditions to give us the maximum amount of racing. Thanks to Sean Dayhew and Adam Craven for the fantastic photos also….Some pretty special shots.
Please remember to pay for the series on line Join

We want to encourage the participation in our facebook page also, where you can comment, post photos and indicate if you are attending the next events as this make organizing so much easier. Facebook

Heat 2 is at one of the best locations in NSW (Huskisson, Jervis Bay 20-21 Oct)…. Huskisson Map

Photos can be found here. Photos(FB)

Results can be found here. Results(pdf)

Slalom Heat 4 @ Botany Bay

dflanagan — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 05:37:47 +0000

NSW Slalom Series 2011-12

Sunday 08Jan12

The final event of the new “Slalom Tour” took place at the new North Kyeemagh car park on Botany Bay, Sydney. 22 hopefuls make the trek to compete in what was a very encouraging 15-20knot NE forecast.

With the wind settling in beautifully down the bay, a simple figure course was set with the fleet divided into 2 heats per round. Unfortunately the wind never settled at the north end of the bay, but continued to send down spurts of wind, which varied in direction by 20-30degrees – not exactly perfect Slalom conditions! Anyway after finally getting the 2 seeding heats away and the Silver race, the Gold race was run to complete the Round and give the event a result. Professional Danish (Now Aussie) racing specialist (Jesper Vesterstrom DEN-111) took the bullet, with Local Frenchman (Remi Dunoyer) using sparkling new Maui sail in 2^nd and Nick Austen (AUS-151) in 3^rd.

No other racing was possible after the final as the wind turned off for the day.

Congratulations to the new NSW Slalom Champion for 2011-12, Brett Morris (AUS-8) who proved that consistency is the key to picking up trophies in the new “series” format.

Some points of interest about the Slalom Series in its debut format/season.

- A total of 31 competitors competed over the 4 events,

- There were 7 new competitors to the race circuit.

- Alex Halank AUS-2001 was the youngest competitor at 10yrs old.

- The smallest fleet of the series was ironically when it was really windy (30+knot SE).

- Racing in Heats of 10 people is much generally fairer and more fun.

- Cancelling an event on the morning is better than running it in sub standard conditions.

A huge thanks to the people who helped get the series off the ground and everyone who embraced the “learn as we go” attitude that was paramount to the enjoyment of the events.

Results are on www.tour-windsurfingnsw.com

Reminder about the BIG event at Hawks Nest in a couple of weeks! (28Jan-04Feb12).

www.fw-australia.com ,for all the information and on-line entry if you have not done yet.

Results:

Heat 4 Results

Overall Slalom Results 2011-12 (After Heat 4)

NSW Formula States / Heat 4 FW

dflanagan — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 21:46:43 +0000

NSW Formula Windsurfing State Championship + NSW Windsurfing Tour (Heat-4)

Ramsgate Beach, Botany Bay, Sydney

Saturday 10Dec-11

With mid-season upon us, the stakes to the game were lifted with Heat 4 of the NSW Windsurfing Tour and the Formula NSW State Championship all wrapped up into one event. The titles attract the trophy hunters and in true Queensland spirit, Sean O’Brien AUS-120 arrived, fresh from the professional European season with a new Formula board and sails in tow, ready to rip our NSW title from our grasp.

The weather was always going to be the biggest challenge of the weekend with 10knot NE forecast for Saturday and potentially nothing on Sunday. This put the Race Officer (RO) under immense pressure to race whenever the wind was at the championship limit (basically 8+ knots from a stationary boat). The wind filled in at about 3pm to the minimum and we were away for what was always going to be a tough session. Steve Floyd AUS-222 bolted on port to lead at the 1st mark on his 11m, only to be tracked down by Sean, with Sam Parker AUS-3 coming in 3rd. In the Free Formula (the old FE+) Barry Fawkes AUS-2111 continued his winning season beating David Flanagan AUS-057 who was sporting a brand new NP EvoIV 10m. Mick Saunders AUS-149 was 3rd.

With the wind still hovering above the limit another race was set in motion. Brett Morris AUS-8 and Sean decided to take the port start option which resulted in a large lead at the 1st mark, which Sean expanded on to win easily. Brett on the other only received a box seat to watch the new and improved (12kgs lighter) Glen Morrell AUS-83, Mike Nelson AUS-12 and Steve Walsh AUS-55 mow him down on the final downwind for a 5th. Barry dominated the FF, but Roger Lucas AUS-303 proved his light wind potential with a 2nd.

With 3 races required for a championship, little chance of racing on Sunday and the wind dying but swinging to the predicted NE, the RO decided to wait until the last possible minute to get in the decisive last race of the day. This proved to be a wise move with the wind swinging and filling in to the best conditions of the day. Sean made it 3 bullets on the hop (welcome back!!!), with Mike and Steve Floyd having strong finishes for the minor places. Barry Fawkes had the same result in the FF with 3 bullets, but 2nd place when to David Howe AUS-688 who is now consistently in the top 5. Mick Saunders produced his third 3rd for the day. With a 7pm finish there was no socializing (that I know of?), just home to a meal and well earned sleep.

Sunday 11 DEc-11

30+ degrees, and a nicely developing easterly breeze surprised us all, and the course was set for more racing until….the sky turned black and the lightening began. Racing was cancelled for safety reasons as the storm was predicted, with no wind to follow, which is exactly what happened. Congratulations to QLD’s Sean O’Brien on getting bragging rights on NSW for another year and also to Barry Fawkes on winning the FF division, which is growing in participation at every event.

Thanks to Nick Nelson our RO, who produced the best possible result from an almost impossible forecast?

Reminder to pre-register and pay for the biggest event of the 2011-12 season, where we are hoping to attract up to 100 competitors. http://www.fw-australia.com/race-office/registration/

Merry Xmas,

Brett Morris

Final Results can be found here:
NSW Formula State Championships Results

Overall Season Pointscore (After Heat 4):
Season Pointscore