Australian Sharpie National Championship - South Australians dominate

9:01 AM Sun 3 Jan 2010 GMT

'67th Australian Sharpie Championship Hobart' Jane Austin Click Here to view large photo

South Australian sailors scooped the pool on the fourth day of competition in the 67th Australian Sharpie national championships sailed today on Hobart's River Derwent and they now fill the three top placings overall.

On a day in which the moderate to fresh breeze changed in strength from 10 to 20 knots and in direction from a nor'wester to a sou'wester - and back again - the strong contingent from Adelaide excelled on the water.

Jason Heritage and his crew of James Davis and Mark Beaumont, sailing Bread Run, notched up two second placings following their previous results of 10-3-1. Discarding the 10th place, they are on 8 points, just one point ahead of fellow South Australians Malcolm Higgins, Sam Sanderson and Andrew Chisholm, sailing Blur.

Blur is on 9 points with a third and a first today, while on 11 points is All Scoobed out, sailed by brother Dave Higgins and his crew of Anthony MItton and Mark Kretschmer, who had a win and fifth place.

Today was off day for previous regatta leader, Tasmanian Rick Buchanan and his crew of One Hump or Two, Andre Declerk and Nick Johnston. Going into today's racing in first place they missed the vital wind shifts in the fluky conditions to place eighth and seventh.

This has dropped them to fourth place overall on 15 points with a series scorecard of 2-4-2-7-8, still within shooting range of a podium finish.

Tomorrow is a lay day with racing resuming on Tuesday for race six of the seven heat national championship.

by Peter Campbell

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Australian Sharpie National Championship - South Australians dominate

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