At 20:13:13 hours Sunday 3rd August Peter Harburg’s Reichel Pugh 66 Black Jack slid across the finish line of the Club Marine Brisbane to Keppel Tropical Yacht Race.
As this is the first running of the race to the new destination Black Jack has set a race record that’s going to be tough to beat.
They finished the race almost in complete darkness with only torches and a spectacular meteorite shower lighting the waters of Keppel Bay.
Sailing with their Code 0 at an extraordinary 6 knots in only 3 knots of easterly breeze, the crew received a shout out from spectator craft that were following their progress from this afternoon.
Skipper Mark Bradford was extremely happy with the yacht and the crew he hand-selected.
“We were pretty lucky with the wind but it does look like it has shut down for the night. We didn’t stop during the race at all which was great especially when the breeze did die right off,” said Bradford.
“As expected Black Jack is a pedigree yacht and we are really happy with her performance and that of the crew. We gelled together with the senior guys encouraging the younger crew to get involved.
“This was our first race and already the crew is improving. We are a great team who just want to go sailing. I’d give this performance 7.5 out of ten!” continued Bradford.
Sir Jack Brabham who put his famous nickname to the yacht is thrilled with their performance and wanting to know how many laps the crew had won by. Sir Jack was reminded that this was yacht racing in a straight line!
The next yacht due to finish as at the 1705 sked is Peter Goldsworthy’s Volvo 60 Getaway-Sailing.com. Bill Wild’s Hugh Welbourne 42 Wedgetail is tipped to cross the line in third. In the 2007 race that finished at Great Keppel Island, Getaway-Sailing.com were the line honours winner with Wedgetail taking out IRC and PHS.
Ray Sweeney’s Farr 11.5 Mondo were just rounding Breaksea Spit at the 1705 sked putting them at the finish line in approximately 24 hours time.
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