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Regatta Update #5 25th March 2008

Folks,

To help you begin your race planning, shown below is an extract from the Sailing Instructions; these will be provided to you in the Welcome Packs, on arrival at Hamilton Island. Please check the tables below against the finalised Sailing Instructions on your arrival at the Island.

H1, H2 etc: Heat 1, Heat2….           ASAP: As Soon As Practicable

Regards,

Carter

Regatta Update #4

Firstly, Happy Easter everyone……

Not long to go now, just a matter of days……………………till the Musto Engwirda Marine 50^th 505 Championships

A Few more Sponsors

We have had a couple more sponsors come on board. Firstly; Mike ClevelandMarine Photography. Some of you will remember Mike from the last Brisbane Nationals. He is a gun photographer and a great bloke, and is giving his time to come and shoot the Nationals, so cough up and buy some of the sensational shots he will take of you.

Next we have an old faithful; Sandy Higgins from Binks Marine has donated a headsail. I have not decided what the prize will be for yet,but have no fear everyone will get a shot at it. Thanks again Sandy.

Lastly, please welcome aboard AV Partners. AV Partners are a local company who have significantly reduced the cost of our AV equipment hire for putting the event on. Phil Delangen, without even hesitating, came on board to help us out. Thank you Phil, I am sure Mike will make the most of the AV equipment to show off his photos.

Check list

Please confirm your barge bookings and make sure that you are sure you are on the barge. Remember- it is an island, and a long way out, so if you miss the barge you may be missing some racing…..

Again,please take all the old stickers and previous event sponsor markings off your boats before we get to Hammo. There are sponsor markings that you will need to put on for the regatta, and since there will some of the sponsors wandering around, I do not want to see any old regatta sponsor material on the boats, personal ones are fine as long as they do not conflict with regatta regulations. We are planning to issue the boat sponsor stickers on Saturday with your welcome pack. It is absolutely our duty to deliver value to the sponsors, so newstickers need to be on for the invitation race, no stickers – no start………………

Measurements

Please remember to bring your measurement certificates and a copy of your insurance; you all know that you require these, so please makesure that you have them. Valid insurance will be checked at registration.

Support

I have had some great discussions over the last 2 weeks with Glen Bourke (newly appointed CEO of Hamilton Island) and with Craig Davidson. The one thing I can assure you is that these guys are going out of their way to help make the regatta a success.  They will both attend the Welcome night and presentation dinner.We may even have a couple of words with Glen at the presentation dinner………………

Race committee and Support team

I would like to take this opportunity to highlight a few of the people who will be involved in the regatta. The one thing all of these people have in common is they put up their hands without hesitation, and are each giving up their own time to be there. They form the race committee as well as general organizers and without them the Regatta would not be possible.

Peter Hewson- Wally is probably one of the longest serving members of the 505 class, former Australian champion, our PRO for the regatta and all round great bloke.

Greg Gardner- Legend in the 505 class, Wally’s good mate and a very welcome member of the race committee  as well as a former 505 world champion

Steve Read- a colleague of mine from work, close personal friend, keen sailor, and a guy who could Google anything first time with the best result.

Marise Hannaford- Quirky’s much better half, keen sailor, good sort and will keep the boys in line.

These are just a few of the key helpers that I want to introduce up front. Make sure they never have to buy their own drinks, and treat them with the respect they deserve….

Attendance Information

Almost everyone has got back to me, guys I need this info to finalize catering numbers, so for the public humiliation list, I need answers off these people:

Mike Davies

Paul Ridgeway

Neil Long

Earle Alexander

Guys I have enough on, please do not make me chase you………………..

Trophies

Finally guys, someone must know where the Teams Trophy is; I wrote about this in the last update with no response. It is confirmed it was won by the Queensland fleet, it is a perpetual trophy and probably our most historic. The onus is absolutely on the winners to take care of perpetual trophies.

Please talk amongst yourselves and find it……….

I will be ropeable if it does not show up in Hamilton Island………………..

Regards

Carter

Regatta Update #3 14th Mar 2008

Hope everyone is getting themselves seriously prepared by now. Here are some extra bits of information to think about and be ready for:

Beach Launching

You may want to think about a dolly wheel for the front of your beach dolly. The tides we are going to be sailing in are not particuarly, favourable to our start times, so we will need to pull our boats a couple of hundred meters down to the water. The start times will be posted early next week and have been chosen, between Wally and myself, so that we are racing whilst there is a lower volume movement of water. The good news is when you come in after racing it will not be as far to go.

Sponsorship

Please take all the old stickers and previous event sponsor markings off your boats before we get to Hammo. There are sponsor markings that you will need to put on for the regatta, and since there will some of the sponsors wandering around, I do not want to see any old regatta sponsor material on the boats, personal ones are fine as long as they do not conflict with regatta regulations. We are planning to issue the boat sponsor stickers on Saturday with your welcome pack. It is absolutely our duty to deliver value to the sponsors, so new stickers need to be on for the invitation race, no stickers – no start………………

Measurements

Please remember to bring your measurement certificates and a copy of your insurance; you all know that you require these, so please make sure that you have them. Valid insurance will be checked at registration.

AGM

The AGM will be held on the Wednesday morning; probably at 9.00am. Please have a think about where we would like to have the Nationals in the following year. There are no Western Australian boats coming this year which is exceptionally disappointing. This does means thatthere is no requirement to go to WA next year under class rules, so think of alternatives for where we may wish to go. I can assure you that

I will not be organizing it, so have a think regarding this before we start the meeting. If people have suggestions please send them through, I don’t just want to hear about them on the day, so let me know early.

Hamilton Island Wildlife

Guys there have been sightings of Box Jellyfish within the Island group, and there are also risks with Irkanji jellyfish. Please make sure you take this into account and are appropriately kitted out to sail; Lycra top and long pant suits or full Lycra are the best things to wear. We will have a full medical brief from the Island medical staff and paramedics as well as Queensland Ambulance representatives who will be there especially for us. This information is only to make you aware and allow you to prepare accordingly - not to scare you.

Attendance Information

I will be asking for final numbers next week for catering purposes. Please be accurate and respond immediately when I send out the notices.  

If you saw last weeks update you would notice it has been blowing dog’s off chains. Make sure your maintenance is up to scratch and you have appropriate spares.

Information Required

Finally guys, someone must know where the Teams Trophy is, if you have any info on this please let Marcus know, because we have to have that trophy back………………

Regards Carter

Regatta Update #2  7th Mar 2008

We are starting to get really close to the regatta, so to help keep you all informed I thought I will keep dropping some reminders and things to think about:

Sponsorship

Firstly some great news! We received a major sponsorship deal with Enquidia Marine. Engwirda Marine Pty Ltd are primarily underwater specialists with unrivalled commercial diving and salvage experience. Their approach and equipment range provides them with the complete versatility required to perform some of the most complex and demanding salvage and marine construction projects from Missima Island, New Guinea, to Hobart, Tasmania and east to New Zealand.

Ronstan are also on board and you should see some new product lines in some of the prizes.

The Musto gear we have up for grabs is awesome.I spent a night at Musto with Duncan Curnow (MD) and the prizes as well as give-aways are sensational, you are not going to be disappointed with the prizes.

Repairs

One thing to think about with spares and tools is that there is at least a 1 day turn around for any major breakages/sail repairs.  You will not be able, for instance, to get any major rigging done. Equipment will need to be sent to Airlie with a one day turn around, so make sure you have some cover defence in your kit bag.

Hamilton Island

Glen Bourke started this week as CEO of Hamilton Island. For any of you who don’t know who Glen is, his most recent gig was running the Volvo Ocean Race, is a legend in the sailing World and all round good guy. This is really going to strengthen us putting the regatta on as well as the future of Dinghy Championships in general, on the Island.

I want everyone to be mindful that we will be sailing out of a resort, with guest paying to be there for other than sailing.  So lets please concentrate on keeping the beach front where we are sailing from very tidy, don’t leave gear everywhere and think about keeping you’re your gear together while we are on the water.

Please also make sure that you have checked and double checked that you have a barge booking. Trust me, there won’t be another one that day if you miss the first one, you will be sailing to Hammo with your luggage. Make sure you leave enough space in your trailers to take any additional luggage you may have on the barge. Remember your cars are not going across.

I Hope everyone is doing their final measurement checks; make it easy on yourselves and us by being ready for the random checks on the island. I am planning to post start times over the next week or so, we are still working on tides and wind conditions;- by the way

see below for the last week, its been smoking…………..

Regards

Carter

PLEASE REMEMBER TO FORWARD  TO YOUR CREWS, OR ANY ONE ELSE WHO MAYBE INTERESTED IN COMING

p.s. it was over 30 again today!!

Regatta Update #1 28th Feb 2008

We are getting closer; only a month to go! I visited the island recently to check preparations and I'm looking forward to a sensational event. Following are some updates and additional information to help you with your preparations.  We aim to send these updates out weekly in the time leading up to the event.

Event Sponsorship

 Great News! We have just managed to secure Musto as a major sponsor for the event. Musto are showing great sport for the event and we are excited by the quality of the clothing as part of the sponsorship. A lot of work has gone on to date

in sourcing other sponsors and we continue to work on gaining further sponsorship.

Boat Preparation

Whilst there is a chandlery on the island, this is geared towards the cruising yachts and not likely to have many of the items that you might be looking for. Given that we will be racing on an island, sourcing replacement gear might prove difficult. They do have some dinghy fittings and most nuts and bolts We therefore suggest you review the spares and replacements you plan to bring along for completeness; particularly rudder pintles and gudgeons since we will be launching off a relatively shallow beach.

Boat Transportation

Have you booked your slot on the barge to get your boat to/from Hamilton Island? Slots and barge sailings are limited, and if you turn up without a booking you may have difficulty in getting your boat across in time for the start.

Accommodation

Have you arranged your accommodation with Hamilton Island? The apartments that are currently reserved for the Association will be released after 28th Feb. After this date, accommodation may still be available but is not guaranteed.

Welcome Night

We will be issuing a program shortly, but just to let you know that a welcome dinner is planned on the Sunday evening around the main resort pool.

Presentation Night

A presentation dinner has been organised for the Friday night, at the Bougainvillea Marquee - where we will be sailing from.

Carter Jackson

Check our www,hamiltonisland.com.au