CYCA's Byron White wins Australian Youth Match Racing Championship

The Cruising Yacht Club of Australia's Byron White, sailed away to a convincing victory in the Australian Youth Match Racing Championship, hosted by the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania.

In the final, White and his crew of Ashlen Rooklyn and Jack Breislin defeated fellow CYCA's Youth Sailing Academy member Tim Forbes-Smith and his crew of Jack Dawson and Daniel Caine in two straight matches.

After impressive sailing over the first two days of competiton, the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania's Chris 'George' Jones and his crew faltered at the last hurdle to finish third overall.

White and Jones had been tied going into yesterday third round-robin, but dropped back in
the qualifiers and then lost their semi-final against Forbes-Smith. The Tasmanians finally finished third overall on a countback from fellow RYCT skipper Zac Pullen.

White and his NSW champion crew came out on top after the three round-robins, then comfortably won their semi-final against Tasmanian Zac Pullen before winning the final against Forbes-Smith, 2-0.

Overall, Pullen placed fifth, with Milly Bennet and her crew from the Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club in Sydney, fifth in the series.

Today's matches were sailed in demanding conditions for all the crews, with the northerly gusting to over 20 knots.

Click here for full results

By Peter Campbell

From the Coach's perspective (Will Ryan)

Byron White along with crew members Ash Rooklyn and Jack Breislin put on a stunning display of crew work and tactics to secure the title with a 2-0 win over fellow club members Tim Forbes-Smith, Jack Dawson and Daniel Caine.

The championship was held at Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania, on the same waters of the Derwent River where the Rolex Sydney to Hobart race finishes each year. Over the 3 days of racing, sailors were met with conditions ranging from 2 to 25 knots, temperatures well down in single digit territory, and an intense race schedule which saw them complete two round robins on individual days. The championship certainly ensured that the best all round sailors came to the fore-front!

While fleet numbers were down, the skill level was not, and the regatta organiser Chris Oh and Chief Umpire John Middleton did a fantastic job to execute an event of a very high standard. It came down to a countback to decide the events semi-finalists, with White placing top spot earning him the opportunity to race RYCT local team, leaving Forbes-Smith and crew to race another local team of Chris Jones who had been the early leader in the event setting up a trans-Bass-Strait match off.

As the regatta came to the pointy end; both CYCA teams turned on the goods, with White comfortably winning 2-0; while Forbes-Smith found form at the right time to secure his teams spot in the finals with a 2-1 win in testing conditions! Setting up an all CYCA final!

One of the biggest challenges the teams noted was the unfamiliarity of the Elliott 5.9 boats. The bowman definitely had their work cut out for them, and as the pressure increased, the crews became all too familiar with the Elliott 5.9's tendency to become more like a submarine as the bows tried to dig down into the water; resulting in quite a few spectacular wipe-outs! 

As the temperature began to drop again in the afternoon, the race committee pushed to finish the finals series a day ahead of schedule. Conditions became more unpredictable with big pressure changes and wind-holes in the course area, but the race committee did a great job to pre-empt these, signalling many a course change to keep the racing fair. White and his crew showed their experience as they exhibited near faultless crew work to keep their cool and link the varying pressure lines together to secure the championship 2-0.

White commented post victory "It was a great week for the boys - this is my first match racing regatta back steering in a long while. I was nervous at the beginning of the event, but by today I felt comfortable and I think our sailing today really showed that. Thank you to the RYCT for hosting the event and thank you to the CYCA. We are really fortunate having the support of the Club and its Youth Sailing Academy"

Most of the team now travels to Melbourne to compete in the Australian Open and Womens Match Racing Championships which start on Thursday 27 through to Sunday 30 September.

Image: CYCA YSA Coach

Winning crew of Jack Breislin, Ashlen Rooklyn and Byron White

Image: CYCA YSA Coach

Tim Forbes Smith and Crew in action at the Australian Youth Match Racing Championship