Paterson wins Cherubs

Press, 30 January 1978, Page 4

Paterson wins Cherubs

PA Auckland. Mark Paterson, of Auckland, is the new and a worthy world champion in the Cherub yacht class.

Paterson won the final two races held over the week-end in the Air New Zealand sponsored series to convincingly take the world championship in the 4m craft.

In all he won five of the seven races, with a second and a disqualification in the other two races. ,In the race he was disqualified in he was judged over the line at the start and failed to return, eventually finishing fourth before his exclusion. With Paterson in Queenie Sarah Jane Blucher IV. was for’ard hand Dave Mac Kay.

Paterson and Mac Kay needed only to finish in the first eight yesterday to take the world title, but sailed something of an overkill to lead all the way for their final race victory. Right on 1

their tail in the last race, as in every other of the series, was another Auckland combination, that of Mark Bell and Simon Daubney, sailing Bad Sneakers. Bell and Daubney finished right on QSJB IV's transom in eacli of the races and in the second race of the series, when Paterson and Mac Kay were disqualified Bad Sneakers was also disqualified for similar reasons.

On the final reckoning, after discarding a worst performance, the gap between Bell and Paterson was 17.7 points.

Bell did all he could today to get past his arch rival on the water, but could not match the down-wind speed of Paterson. It was the same case on Saturday, with Bad Sneakers being less than a minute behind at the finish, but the gap to the next boat in the fleet, and eventual third place-getter. Stardust, was almost three minutes, which represented quite a gap in the 12 to 18 knot north-easterly breeze.

Results;— Race six-—QSJB IV iM. Paterson) 1, Bad Sneakers (M. Bell) 2, Stardust (A. Pearson. Australia) 3, Fluid Drive (P. McNeill) 4, Bad Jelly (T. Nye) 5, Willy Again (S. O’Connor, Australia) 6, Hot Dog (D. Finch. Britain) 7, Firecracker (G. Ferguson, Australia) 8, Mr X (G. Bird) 9. Hercules GT (A. Caldwell) 10.

Race seven.—QSJß IV 1, "Bad Sneakers 2. Fluid Drive 3. Fire cracker 4, Hot Dog 5, Bad Jelly 6, Kwanza (P. Stacey) 7, Stardust 8. Sciamachy (D. Babcock, Britain) 8. Freddy (C. Brockliss) and Freedom Express (M. Jones) (equal) 10 . Points (after dropping worst performance): QSJB IV 3, Bad Sneakers 20.7, Stardust 38.7. Fluid Drive 47.7. Firecracker 61.7. Bad Jelly 69.4, Hercules GT 77.7. Freedom Express 87.7. Willy Again 83.1. Hot Ppg 95.