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Port of Yamba Yacht Club winter break

ABOVE: Sue Stone and Steve Stocker, owners of “Scurrilous”, receive the Founding Fathers’ Regatta Championship shield from PYYC founding member Annie Miller. RIGHT: Regatta Champion “Scurrilous” in action. Images: Contributed.
ABOVE: Sue Stone and Steve Stocker, owners of “Scurrilous”, receive the Founding Fathers’ Regatta Championship shield from PYYC founding member Annie Miller.
RIGHT: Regatta Champion “Scurrilous” in action.
Images: Contributed.
  The Port of Yamba Yacht Club is commencing a two month break over winter after a very busy sailing season. Over the past 10 months we have held 66 yacht races including two regattas. All the race series have been completed and the presentation of trophies and awards will be on Friday 2 September. Well done to “Bacchus” and crew who travel from north of Alstonville every week and who won the club championship for the second year in a row. We finished the 2015/16 season on a high last week-end with the Founding Fathers’ Regatta. We had three races; two on Saturday and a longer one on Sunday to Harwood and back to Yamba. Yachts and trailer-sailers from the Gold Coast, Ballina, Grafton and Coffs Harbour joined the local fleet for a sailing, eating and partying fest. The weather was always going to be a worry with two week-ends out of the past five experiencing heavy rain and gale force winds that would have seen the event cancelled. As it happened the opposite was the case with extremely light winds forecast. The two Saturday races were held in light and variable winds and were very testing affairs, but at least they were completed. Sunday’s passage race began well, but on the way back to Yamba the fleet sailed into glassy, windless water and came to a halt. In fact many of the boats started drifting backwards as the current was still flowing upstream. Only the yacht that was in the lead at the time, “Scurrilous”, escaped the windless area and eased across the finish line just seven minutes before the race time limit was up. As the only boat to complete the three races, “Scurrilous” was declared the regatta winner and owner Steve Stocker and partner Sue Stone, from Grafton, were presented with the trophy by founding PYYC member Annie Miller. Other founding members Stafford Sheldon and Jim O’Keeffe presented trophies to the winner of the Trailer-Sailer and Multihull divisions as well as line honours for the fastest outright boat. These were “Outlook” from Runaway Bay, “Scrat” from Tullymorgan and “Tiga” from Sapphire Beach. Congratulations to all the winners, and thanks to the army of helpers cooking, serving food and drinks, cleaning up afterwards, crewing the course boat and assisting with the handicapping and race management. We are looking forward to seeing all the visiting boats and crew again at the Easter Regatta next year. Although we are having a well-deserved rest, you may see some of us at Kolora Lake now and then sailing our radio controlled yachts. Also we are still open on Friday nights from 5pm and visitors are welcome to meet members and get information on sailing and crewing while partaking in a quiet drink and nibblies. Visit our web site at www.portofyambayachtclub.com.au for more information on any of the above. Our events calendar for next season will be there for viewing or downloading as soon as it is finalised. Andrew Soesan