The Farrawa Cup Series concluded with the 67th Bunbury and
Return Ocean Race over the weekend of 17-18 January. Royal Freshwater Bay Yacht
Club is proud to host the annual event, WA’s oldest blue water event. The 169
nautical mile race is rewarding and challenging and a highlight of the WA
offshore season.


A hot day was forecast for Saturday
as yachts started north of Fremantle Harbour in a steady 12 knot wind. They
looked spectacular off the line and it was a close contest around the day buoy
located off Port Beach. Spinnakers flew and the fleet did their best to get around
the western beacon and turn south before the wind began to fade.



Spectators had the luxury of watching
the race online; all yachts carried tracking devices. The race has come a long way
since the days of plane surveillance. In the mid 1960’s considerable media
attention meant progress reports were sought after. RFBYC then approached Club
member Tally Hobbs who had acquired his pilot’s licence. Accompanied by a
spotter, he would fly over the scattered fleet and provide updates both for spectators
and safety. This continued until the 1980’s when ship to shore radio’s were
enforced.


After sailing in a light shore breeze
for a couple of hours, the wind soon turned and increased. Competitors enjoyed the
race down to the turning mark boat in Bunbury Harbour. TP52 Calm was the first there but had to get
a move on to get back and beat the race record of 18hrs, 57min, 18sec.


There was an amazing sunset that
evening as most of the yachts approached the turning point. Although beautiful,
it looked like the night would bring light winds. Thankfully the sky soon
cleared and brought a stronger south westerly wind which was picked up by the
bigger boats who had headed further offshore.

Skipper of Calm, Andrew Harry, commented “We made a plan before the race and
stuck to it but with light winds, we didn’t think we’d have a chance at the
record. We got to Garden Island and realised we were back in with a chance. We
thought we would get close, within minutes, but as we headed back in to the
coast the wind shut down and even went north east for a while.” The team
finished in 20hrs, 34min, 8sec.



For those who hugged the shore on the
way back north, most waited in very little wind during the night.


There was a good competition between
the two GP 42’s who raced within sight all the way to the end. Black Betty had fallen behind but picked
up some stronger wind further out to sea and caught up to Dirty Deeds near the southern end of Rottnest. Dirty Deeds gybed close in front when then, Black Betty picked up a cray pot. Gary McNally from Black Betty said, “Sailing in to the
morning sun made it difficult to see the water and picking up the craypot
really slowed us down. We had it caught on the keel and then another around the
rudder too”


On Dirty Deeds, their comment was that the gods must have seen them
smiling at Black Betty’s misfortune so
gave them a craypot to collect too. She managed to keep her lead to the finish
with only 3 minutes between them after racing for just over 24 hours.



The Double Handed division was won by
Lamotrek. Overall IRC Division Two
was won by Giddy Up with Blondie and This Way Up both very close behind, all finishing with a minute of
each other on corrected time.

Being a bigger boat certainly had its
advantages in this year’s race, they got through in the best of the wind.
Overall and in Division One Calm
managed a win a few minutes ahead of Dirty
Deeds and then Black Betty.


It was a great event with many of the
crews already keen to race again next year.


RFBYC Offshore Media