WINNERS ARE GRINNERS: WAKA RACING TAKE NZ CHAMPIONSHIPS

by Waka Racing | 21/11/10

Dockside after victory. PHOTO: Brad Davies

Today was the fourth and final day of the New Zealand Match Racing Championships. Conditions were a fresh, blustery, South Westerly breeze. We battled throughout to beat Josh Junior and his Wellington Spirit team 3 – 1 in the finals.

 We went out this morning 1 nil up in the best of five finals. After feeling very comfortable all week in the light to moderate Northerly conditions we had to face a new set of conditions. The racing was action packed with Josh and his team pushing us all the way around the track. Boat handling was vital in these conditions with both teams struggling at times to keep the boat running at 100%.  However in the end great starts and getting the first shift allowed us to maintain a narrow lead through out most of the races. The only hiccup came in the third race when ahead on the final leg to the finish all onboard jumped the gun and hoisted the spinnaker too early causing a big twist up. Josh narrowly beat us to inflict our second loss of the regatta.
 
Winning this championship caps off a great week for the team. As not only do we now get to put our names alongside some of the world’s best sailors who have also won it but we can tick off a lot of other goals we had set this week.
 
This event was the first time we had ever sailed with our new bowman Hayden Goodrick, who is doing all three of these events with us (NZ Nationals, Australia Cup, and Monsoon Cup). Bearing this in mind we sat down prior to this event as team and talked about what we wanted to achieve in order to be peaking at the Monsoon Cup. Pretty much we said as long as we achieved these goals we did not mind where we placed at this event. However so far things have gone very well. Hayden as gelled well with the team and his experience definitely lifted the rest of us to a higher level.
 
However there are still things we want to work on and the next step is the Australia Cup in Perth, starting on the 24th of November. Here we will hopefully ‘keep the truck rolling’ and push our sailing forward to another level.
 
Enjoy the ride,
 
Waka Racing 

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