10:48 AM Tue 22 Dec 2009 GMT
Launceston yachtsman Richard Fisher is looking for a much faster sail down Tasmania's East Coast than a year ago when he skippers his Beneteau First 40.7 Blue Sky in next week's Sargisons Launceston to Hobart Yacht Race.
'Last year we had a relaxed cruise down to Hobart to use the yacht as a live-aboard base for my family while I contested the B14 Australian and Word Championships on the River Derwent, but this it will be a full-on racing voyage,' the Tamar Yacht Club's immediate past Commodore said today.
Blue Sky heads five Tamar River yachts in the record 35 boat fleet contesting the 285 nautical mile race that starts off Inspection Head wharf at Beauty Point at 1pm next Sunday, 27 December.
Tourism and Sport & Recreation Minister Michelle O'Byrne will fire the cannon to send the fleet on the down river dash to Low Head where the historic fog horn will signal the first boat out into Bass Strait.
Blue Sky is one of four highly successful Beneteau First 40.7s in the fleet, the others being Stuart Denny's Blue Chip from Hobart's Bellerive Yacht Club, Sally and Rob Smith's Helsal 5 from the Derwent Sailing Squadron, and Nicholas Cole's Mojo Rising from the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania.
'It will be a hotly contested race within a race, with the 40.7s also well placed to do well on overall handicap results,' Fisher said.
A versatile sailor, Richard Fisher's successes have ranged from a State junior championship in Mirrors, and senior State titles in Lasers, 125 Sabres (with his wife Katrina) and two State titles in Sports Boats with his Elliott-designed Shoot the Dog.
More recently, his sailing has been in the high-performance B14s and with his keelboat, Blue Sky, while he is also actively involved in junior training programs at the Tamar Yacht Club's Beauty Point annex and in a $1 million development program of the club's marina.
'Several of the crew of Shoot and Dog are joining me for the Sargisons L2H race, the crew comprising Robert Matthews, Adrian Hardman, Bill Rostrom, Mike Spotwood, Justin Foster, Rob Moreton and Anthony Cornish,' added Fisher.
The other Tamar yachts in the fleet are John Joyce's Lyons 14 Allusive, Ross Carey's 12m Van de Stadt design, Careena, Sebastian Verbeeten's 9m Finlay design, Kings Meadows Capital Chemist, all representing the Tamar Yacht Club, and Rob McLelland, Drew Murray's Briand 60 Magic Miles, and Jamie Cooper's Beneteau 42, Premium Constructions, representing the Port Dalrymple Yacht Club.
by Peter Campbell
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Sailing
