We hope everyone has hunkered down and is coping with cyclone Gabriel’s onslaught.

In the rainy weather, we have had some time to put together a short video of our twilight rum race on Friday.

Our twilight rum racing fleet grew to 15 boats on Friday with three beautiful gaff-rigged classics joining in the action.

Terry Dunn entered his Logan designed “Aotere” for the first time and was joined by “Leto” and “Balaena”. The three gaffers all started together and looked magnificent as they headed off down to Southerns.

In a lovely 10-knot Southeasterly “Saltshaker” proved hard to catch, finishing first ahead of “Nexus” with “The Business” third.

“Aotere” accounted well for herself to finish just ahead of “Outlaw” in 10th, well done Terry and crew!

Congrats to “Angry Dragon” who in addition to finishing 4th also won the draw.

We had 13 starters for Race 10 of the North Sail’s twilight Rum race series on Friday with Leto, Sensation and 4 Fox Sake joining for the first time.  Welcome guys! 

Leto really looked beautiful out there.

Some great races within the race between Sensation and Flying Cloud, Nexus and Uenuku and Outlaw, Simply Red and Kantime.

The Business took the win ahead of Simply Red and Outlaw which sets things up for an exciting final two races for the series. 

Results here

Here’s a short on the water video of the race.

Last night saw 9 boats on the water for race 2 of the North Sails Twilight rum race series. The wind stayed in long enough to have most of the fleet closing up for the final run to the finish before dying completely. Unfortunately, Vertigo our race leader just couldn’t make it across the finish line in time before the 7.45 cutoff and we had to abandon the race.

Great to see the fleet growing and lots of younger sailors taking the opportunity to get out there and have some fun.

A big welcome to the Ross 40 “The Farm” (ex Te Rauparaha) who have joined the fleet along with Nexus, Hot Pursuit and Kantime.

With no first prize to be claimed there was only one bottle of rum to be won in the draw and “Outlaw” who should be renamed “ The Rum Race Robbers” won their second bottle of rum in as many weeks! Well done team!

Also on the water to watch the finish were Rose and Matt from “Cuckoo” who positioned their floating spa on the visitors jetty to get the best view while having a relaxing soak!! Only in Opua!! Check them out in the video.

To give us the best chance of getting a result each week your race officer has decided that if needed the Officer of the day should have the ability to ask boats to self-finish on the transit line between the Okiato pole and the white leading light beacon just North of English bay. If asked to, boats will radio in on Channel 77 as they cross the line to record their finish and this could help avoid the sometimes tricky conditions in the channel in a dying breeze. The pursuit race instructions and course map on the website have been adjusted accordingly.

A big thank you to our Commodore Ian Templeman for running the race and everyone who came out to play.

Such a great atmosphere with so many happy faces in the club after racing, we look forward to seeing you all again next Friday!