Big Regatta This Week-end On The Waimakariri

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29366, 19 November 1960, Page 5

Big Regatta This Week-end On The Waimakariri

QNE of the major yachting events of the season in Canterbury will be the championship regatta on the Waimakariri river this week-end.

The vast'change in yacht construction in the last few years has brought with it new and improved sailing techniques; but it has also made the boats themselves more easily portable and provided an incentive for owners to cart them from water to water instead of merely moving from and to dub moorings on the water. Reflection This year’s regatta, conducted by the Waimakariri Sailing Club, is expected to reflect the effects of light boat construction both in entries and yachUsmanship. Today, the Idlealong and R Class Squadron championships are programmed. Boats of the former class are dwindling in numbers throughout New Zealand as their solid construction and sluggish performance, compared with the more modern designs, are against them. Only a small entry is expected in this championship. The R Class racing dinghies are a different story. They are the glamour yachts, the extremely fast centre-boarders whose planing runs under full canvas (or these days, terylene, which costs more and draws better) are a delight to the crew and spectator alike. Most of the R’s are gleaming varnished shells that have been

built by the men who sail them; a cabinet-maker looking at them would admire the care that has obviously been expended on them so that they look more like pieces of craft furniture than the term “dinghy” implies. The top skippers in Canterbury will be taking part in this event, and as many as 20 boats are expected to cross the line in the flying start at 3 pm. The present champion is Tony Shields, who headed all the other R's in his boat, Vision, on toe river last year. Another event is the North Canterbury Takapuna championship which is expected to be dominated mainly by Estuary boats. The most spectacular race of the lot will be an all-comers handicap race, open to any yacht and the mark for toe many craft that do not fit into toe exclusive class races. This year, toe good class boats and the odds and sods alongside them, are expected to make up a fleet of about 40 boats. In toe past they have made a magnificent sight in an easterly as, with spinnakers set, they have moved upriver in a jostling bunch. The Frostply and Finn Class championships are due to be held tomorrow. Frostplies The Waimakariri Club itself will probably be entering five boats in the former contest; other Frostplies are on toe Estuary but many of them are owned by youngsters who may not have the facilities to travel and they may not appear in force.

Now in their third season, toe Finns are a growing class. These are toe single-sailed, stayless craft of Olympic fame and about a dozen are expected to turn cut. R Class teams racing on Sunday will be between representative boats of each club. This is an event of pure tactics—intensely interesting to the yachtsman, but highly confusing and bewildering to the uninitiated watcher.