First Race a Resounding Success
(Sydney, Australia)- The first of the new sprit J/100s landed in Australia and it has sailed its first events off Sydney Heads. Here's a brief report from Roy Entwistle regards their first sailing experiences aboard this fun evolution of the J/100: "J/100 hull no. 163 had a few firsts before it even raced, the first J/100 into Australia, the first J/100 with a bowsprit, and first J/100 with the anchor locker."The delighted owner Ralph Hillman had this to say about his new J/100 after its first race in Sydney Harbour last Saturday: "I am not really a racer and purchased the boat for enjoyable, no fuss day sailing. She is a standard J/100 with a simple sail wardrobe consisting of a 105% non overlapping jib, mainsail & asymmetric spinnaker. We were so impressed with the boats performance and ease of sailing we decided to enter the J/ 100 named JOHN JERVIS into a Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron winter race. The local handicapper placed the J/100 in division one which consists of much larger boats than the 10 meter J/100. From a custom stripped out Bakewell White 36 up to a Hanse 54 and most things in between including the usual mix of boats, Beneteau 36.7’s, Northshore 369’s Bavaria 38’s ,40,7’s Cavalier 395’s and some large X Yachts to name few. You can imagine our delight when we rounded the top mark set near Sydney Harbour Bridge at Kirribilli Point in second place just behind the X43. With the spinnaker set and dodging the fort y plus footers still heading up the beat, we glided back down the harbour towards Shark Island at almost wind speed making up ground on the large X Yacht. With a dying breeze the course was shortened . At one stage it looked like we may even cross the finish line first on scratch but as we rounded the lee of Shark Island the much taller rigs of the larger X Yacht and Bakewell White helped them ghost through just ahead of us. The J/100 was absolutely fantastic to windward with many of our competitors complimenting the boat on how high and fast we could point. Downwind, the asymmetric was a dream to use and gibe. This was our first race so the boat has great potential as we get to know her better. We look forward to racing our J/100 again soon. JOHN JERVIS was First Lord of the Admiralty in the days of Nelson, so we have some big shoes to fill!" For more J/100 sailboat information.