Australian Women's Keelboat Regatta 2025 - Day 1
by Di Pearson / AWKR media 7 Jun 21:01 NZST
6-9 June 2025
Gridlock and her bright spinnaker on a dull day - 2025 Australian Women's Keelboat Regatta © Andrea Francolini
Rain, a forecast for 20 plus knots with gusts and a cold day on Port Phillip didn't dampen the enthusiasm of those here sailing on Day 1 of the 2025 Australian Women's Keelboat Regatta (AWKR), participants just keen to put to bed a first race or two in Australia's premier Women's keelboat event today.
Race Officer, Lou Hutton, was confident the day would be fine for racing, so sent the fleet out for two races, starting from 10am. The rain cleared and while dark clouds looked ominous, big patches of blue sky shood them and the rain away.
Claire Heenan skippering the Adams 10, Salvage Drinks Co Jungle Juice, cleaned up in both races. Heenan has top placed here in the past and last year, with Justine Ella at the helm in Heenan's absence, the Adams 10 won under the name Jungle Juice. This time around, Ella is on mainsheet.
Katie Holroyd (Vic) was in hot pursuit of Heenan and crew in both races. She is also sailing an Adams 10, Serious Yahoo, which she has skippered here previously.
"We sailed in 15-20 knots across the two races. It got a bit lighter at the end of the first race and then picked up again for Race 2," Heenan recounted of their two windward/leeward courses. "We had good starts and picked the shifts up the first work in both races," she said.
The Gosford sailor has a different crew with her this year. "We have some new people; three from Newcastle and two each from Gosford and the Derwent Sailing Squadron in Tasmania. This is the first time we've sailed together, although different portions have sailed together at different times."
The crew arrived in Melbourne early to train, but a gale warning stopped them in their tracks.
"We couldn't train, but everyone has done a lot of sailing on their own terms, so we just had to work out who was sailing in what position. Clean drops and sailing clean were important to get good results from the team," Heenan said.
A big fan of the Adams 10, Heenan commented, "The boat performs well in light and heavy air. If I owned a race yacht, I'd own an Adams 10. They are a great all-round boat, but when it's fresh, boat handling becomes important."
On their performance in the opening racings today, Heenan said, "The crew is happy, they're a great bunch of ladies who are all pitching in at one of my favourite regattas."
Holroyd (Vic) will need to put the foot down hard tomorrow if she is to overcome Heenan. Robyn Ragauskas (Vic) is in third place with Bull 9000, Bullet after posting 3-5 results and will no doubt be looking for vengeance tomorrow.
In the S80 division, Deb Parker (VIC) showed local knowledge helps by winning both S80 races on Double Shot - or maybe the crew did it on double shots of coffee?
Keeping in tune with the coffee theme, respected Queensland sailor, Lisa Beecham, brought Espresso home second after scoring 2-3 results, while Emma Maartens (Vic) skippered Hot Shot to third place with 4-2 placings. With a different crew, Hot Shot won here last year, so the pressure is on the experienced Maartens now.
"It's good to win both races, not quite sure how we did that," said a happy Parker from Victoria.
"The first race, the water was quite nice and flat and we had a north to north-westerly wind. It was our second sail on the boat and only three of us on the crew did the practice. Today was the first time the crew had sailed on the boat together since the last time we competed at this regatta in 2022.
Parker said they were sailing a different boat this year and was finding it a little hard to get used, especially the placement of the instruments, but they soon came good.
"For the first race we had a reef and a Number 3, sailing conservatively. Then the breeze dropped down, so we shook the reef out and then the wind came in again, and had swung to the west, but it was fine with the full main."
In the second race, Parker said she stayed focussed. "I was steering to the spinnaker, but I could hear someone right behind us who seemed to be sailing faster than we were, so I took the boat up higher so they couldn't pass us," she said of beating Hot Shot by a very close six seconds.
"We had a great time, especially considering our two terrible starts!"
Parker when on to say, "Lou (Hutton) is a very good race officer and I loved the two windward/leewards she sent us on today. They gave us a chance to learn the boat and get into the racing again.
And we have the best boat owner, Sean Supanz. He scrubbed the bottom of the boat yesterday, with an arm in a sling! He was down this morning, went on the water to cheer us on and was at the end of the wharf cheering us in this afternoon. We only met him when we got the boat to borrow two weeks ago" and he's been great."
It was fitting that RMYS's new Rescue Boat was christened at the AWKR after racing concluded today.
"It was christened Gai Clough', in remembrance of the Club's and Australia's first female Commodore. She was also the founder of the Australian Women's Keelboat Regatta 33 years ago," said Regatta Chairwoman, Monica Jones. "It was special to be able to do that in front of all our AWKR entrants, including her daughter, Sarah, who is competing here as skipper of Crusader."
Last night at the AWKR briefing, at host venue, Royal Melbourne Yacht Squadron'(RMYS), incomparable MC, Dee Mason, had a few interesting questions in store for the assembled competitors.
As a result of her questions, turns out around one fifth of the room are newcomers, around the same amount have done it at least 10 times, few have ticked off 20 or more. Just one - Sabina Rosser - have gone the distance. This year represents her 31st. Rosser has missed only two since the inaugural race sailing with Gai Clough. She will be hard to go past!
It's a brilliant recommendation that so many keep coming but back to compete and equally, that new players keep emerging.
Entrants are here representing Tasmania, Queensland, Northern Territory, South Australia, NSW and of course, Victoria.
Racing continues tomorrow from 10am, with two further races planned.
Full results on event website: www.awkr.com.au