Malaysian Match Racing Championship - Monsoon Cup Qualifier Day 1 to 3

We are through to the semi finals!!!
Koo Racing Team - AC Law are in the Semi Finals!

Day 1,

Having not sailed together as a team before, there is some concern how we will work as a Team.
In fact we only got our first team photo on day 1 ! and we have been out of the match racing scene for 2 years now.

We only managed a match on day 1, where we go against putrajaya 5 O. They are a relatively a new team. Therefore we managed to win comfortable with them having a blag flag after they failed to do the second penalty immediately after the start.

The black flag gave us lot of time to work on our boat handling,moves and team work, which we needed very badly.


Day 2.

We were quite confident at the end of the first day but we were put firmly back to the ground on the first match of day 2 against Team Navy 1. We lost the match, but I personally see it as wake up call for us. This is how they beat us to the line, pre start we gave them a penalty, then they started in front of us, a few tacking duels, we kinda screwed up one of the tack, they surge ahead.

No spinnaker allowed, so it was basically a tight reach back to the mark, after that match we felt were very disappointed and very restricted of not having a spin to fly.

we went back to the drawing board, rectifying all our mistakes after the defeat and then bounced back immediately to win all the remaining matches in day 2 and joint top the leader board with Sail Putrajaya.

Day 3,

We carried the momentum from day 2, continuing winning all our races convincingly and finish top of the round robin 1 leader board!





We will face Team Taring Pelangi in the Semifinal tomorrow!

out
sean

HELP Sailing Club - Sailing Day !

Last Saturday 17th October was fantastic day for me, I was invited by Ai li to go sailing with her bunch of Help Sailing Club members and that kinda gave me a reason to wake up on a Saturday Morning.


It was a great day! For the sun was kind and the wind was blowing. There were lots of them,like around 15-ish people, and the lucky three who managed to go onboard with us are Jeff, Fred and Wei Wen.

We are suppose to instill sailing interest into them for this is their first time on board a sail boat! And what better boat to do just that than our Platu where everyone have to be involve to sail the boat.

All three of them didn't take much time to learn the basics of tacking and jibing maneuvers. Wei wen was on the main sail trim, while Fred and Jeff were taking care of the front sail.

On our way back we even managed to spot some dolphins,
and that really made my day, for all the time that I have sailed at port klang, this is actually my first time spotting a dolphin here.

Sean

Built up to the Malaysian Match Racing Championship 2009 - Monsoon Cup 2009 Qualifier

I have been thinking..

Ever Since we completed our registration for the Malaysian Match Racing Championship I have been trying to fill in the remaining 11 slots of Teams, trying to figure out who is going to compete with us the get the qualifying slot for the Monsoon Cup 2009.

For Teams that I am certain we will see..

1. Team RSYC/99°/View Point - Skippered by Rolf Heemskerk ; I will rate Rolf's Team as one of the favorites. I personally sailed with Rolf before, and he is a very a good helmsman, whats lacking in the Team are the Match Racing Experience, other that than that I am sure they will have a great time at the qualifying

2.Team RSYC- Skippered by Tom(Rizal) - I have known Tom ever since I started sailing and that was 14 years ago, and I can tell you guys, that he is good, he was the Malaysia's Sea games Representative for platu in 2007 ; and I will say he definitely have a chance at the Championship.

3 & 4 .Navy1 & Navy 2-I am not sure about Navy2, but I am very sure that Navy1 will be skippered by Razali, Razali's Team was the finalist in 2007 and the semi finalist in 2008.

Teams that we could see,

5. Perak Sailing Team- Skippered by Nurul Ain. Last Year Winner! Ayin, have told me that she intends to compete, but nothing is confirm yet, but if she turns out, as the reigning champion, she is automatically one of the favourites.

6 MYA KFC Team-Skippered by Razman. Last Year finalist, I have not much info on this guy but after some google'ling I found out he is quite active and have been winning some platu races. Since he was a finalist last year, and he was quoted as the team to beat by the Navy in a recent Newspaper cutting, we will just put him as a favourite.


Other Teams we may see.

7.Sail Putrajaya skippered by Elia, She was crown the most promising sailor in the recent Monsoon Cup Sailing School at putrajaya, I rate her as having a chance at the championship.

8.Team Asian Yachting skippered by Ayin from RSYC!. This year Asian yachting.com is sending a team and will be skippered by Ayin form the Royal Selangor yacht Club!.I rate her as having a chance at the championship.

9. Duyong Heritage Sailing Team - Since they were one of the teams who went for the Monsoon Cup Sailing School at putrajaya, I believe we may see them

10&11, Team Johor and Team Terengganu, these 2 teams have been part of the Malaysian Match Racing Championship since 2006, lets hope we see them too.


Finally our Team
12 Koo Racing Team-Ac Law, Skippered by Jeremy Koo.

thats all =P
more posts coming up

regards
Sean

Sunday 14th Cruiser Race !

Sunday 14th , was looking really over crowded when there was a total of 12 crews available for Mat Hari, we managed to trim it to 10 but on Sunday we ended with only 7 .

It was then I had a feeling we are going to have a very good workout today with Vincent on the helm, Gwen, Nurul Ain and her sister Ngah on the Trim, Yew on the Main, Wai li on the pit and me me taking care of the foredeck.

It was Nurul's First time on Mata Hari, therefore Yew moved to main to give a her bigger learning space as we gear up towards Raja Muda Selangor international Regatta.

Race 1, Current was strong at about 2-3 knots from the west, Wind coming from north west. The start of race 1 was rather straight forward as we only 3 tack to reach the first mark. After Mark 1 we were on tight reach with the spin, I made a mistake of changing the down haul too early, and as the wind swung to the front we needed to hoist the front sail back. I scrambles to put it back on and that most probably cost us the bullet as we finisht joint second with Martin while the U20 took the bullet.

Race 2, we were really slow off the starting line as the wind begins to die off, still we were first off the line, and as the race progress the wind picks up to about 7-8 knots. We lead from the start and caught every possible shifts we could. It was a race without much or any mistakes and we went home with a bullet on hand.


To sum up the day we went berbuka puasa with nurul at port village restaurants and had a really heavy dinner.

Our Current Confirm Crew List for RMIR now includes Nurul Ain and Wai li,

Sean

Sunday 6th September, Sailing Day!

We had another awesome sailing day, and this is how we got it...

Started the day at the Royal Selangor Yacht Club, wind wasn't blowing in the morning,
this worries me a bit as we will be sailing with six today with pik yi coming on board,
and to add, there is a change to the sailing plan, Jeremy Camps our club Sailing Secretary decided that we should do some match racing too.
Off we go, Today we have Vincent on the helm, yew on the Trim, Pikyi and Simon sharing the pit, Hoe on the main and me as usual on the foredeck.



Race 1, fleet race - Wind went up to around 10 to 12 knots , and the left side of the course looks favor with its shallow water, current is about lets say 2 knots . Wind and current both from south east.

We started well but Jeremy camps had the best start, with the strong current everyone was heading to the shallow water first. Those who didn't got left a little behind. Nearing the Windward mark, we are one of the 3 boats in contention to round the windward mark first. We had Jeremy but somehow Tom managed to sneak passed us rounding the mark first with us close behind. Down at leeward mark, we tries to get room, Tom some how had some problem with its spinnaker. We capitalize on it and never looked back.

Race 2, Match Racing - Us against Ayin's Team, Ayin will be taking helm for Team AsianYachting.com for the Malaysian Monsoon Cup qualifier later this year, we were on port side, Ayin was late coming into the line, we sailed pass her and went straight behind the committee boat, and then we were circling each other by doing tacking and gybing. Hoe needed the warm up as its has been quite sometimes since he trim the main this much. Ayin was too into it, and didn't realize the time, we started ahead, she made a mistake of going to the right side of the course first instead of getting into the shallows first. We won the race.

Match Race 2, we were on bye, as we rested we observed the other teams. All of them rounded the mark on starboard as oppose to port as written on the Sailing instruction. Though Match Race are normally done on starboard rounding, it is not at all unusual to do port rounding. Always read the Notice of Race and the Sailing instructions. I received the NoR for the Malaysian Qualifier the other day, perhaps I shall share it here another time.

Race 3, Match Race, Us against Tom, Tom is a very good sailor. He will be one of the entries for our club, is it not known whose his crews are, I do hope he gets to bring his own crew.

We started against them with a dial up, he move from the dial up and made a mistake of sailing to the port side, the pin end. we bore off fast and tried to keep him on the pin end, yet we were slow and we started circling, moments passed and we were push to the middle of the starting line by the current. 1 minute left, we were both on starboard tack, we were the leeward board, we had overlap and tried to push him off the line, but then the wind swung towards the east backfiring our plan, and he started ahead of us with us following closely, we only mange to caught up in the leeward mark, where we managed room, and got ahead after that, but Tom was sailing really fast with them taking the lead back on the windward mark. But he had no idea wind swung again to the east, now the wind is blowing north east. He made a mistake of gibing first to take advantage of the current. Vincent realize the wind condition and asked us the hold as we are on a tight reach to the finishing pin already! Tom realizing his mistake and gybed back. But it was too late as we took the 3rd bullet of the day.


4th Race - Fleet Racing - Its a sail back to the club, it would be a spinnaker run back to the club, but the wind had been swinging to the north. therefore it could be too shy to fly the spin.

We started with Jeremy below us and Tom above us on windward, he was the first the hoist the spin as we decides to wait. Bad idea, Jeremy and us immediately pulled ahead, with having to sail a few degree lower than us, half the course, yew decided its time for us to hoist, by this tim Tom have already downed his spin and trying to sail high. We hoisted , and Jeremy pull away sailing higher, yew reasoning was, we sailed the shorter course. Anyway we caught at the erm..river junction to the club. now we are both on a square run, starboard tack with us covering them with the wind and current favoring us.We went ahead and ends our day with another bullet!

Still talking about the mark rounding after the race.


We Improved our leads to 3 points!!

I had the wind behind my back..3 months of updates

I know I have not been writing for the past months, I have been in a somewhat an overdrive, where I have been committed to sailing , work , family (mostly to uncles and aunties if you're reading this, Reese ) and also my social life. But this blog is about sailing, So this what I have been doing ,

Heritage Bay Cup (June 2009)
I was thrilled when I was invited by Mira to become a casual coach for the heritage Bay Cup, personally I am not a very good coach, communication isn't really my forte, so there is something to be learned in this trip to Pulau Duyong. And yes I learned heaps in dealing with new sailors from Dave Mills, not only that, I went back to the basic of sailing and strengthens it.

I also caught up with Nurul Ain, 2008 Malaysian Match Racing Winner! Managed to put some interest in her to join us, Mata Hari for Raja Muda Selangor International Regatta this coming November 2009 and from I last heard she is very likely to join us as our Trimmer.

Phuket Race Week 2009 (July)

This time I sailed with Niels on Pheonix, and then we have Pik Choo, Martin, Alex, Pierre and also Ai li on board, we came in third overall in our class. The highlight of this trip was my performance on foredeck which was good as I avoided all major screw ups, kept the skipper worried free of the foredeck and also my stay on Cateleya a 40ish footer cruising catamaran. It was fun staying on a boat, but it can get really boring for I am basically stuck there as it is anchored out in the sea. But nevertheless I had really good fun racing! Thanks to Niels and Pik Choo for the invites!!

Matahari 's Delivery 2009

Kinda ashamed to say, that this is my first delivery for Mata Hari having sailed on her for the past 4-5 years. So I got to do this, and luckily for me this delivery turns out to be a cruising trip.
It was fun and it was really tiring as we got in on a Monday morning and I went straight to work!

We started out with Vincent, Mat Nor and me, Our first stop is Penang, where we picked up Gweyn and Mel, then we continue through the stars and storm. Next Stop Pangkor, we arrived in the afternoon, stayed a night, big dinner and start sailing again the next day to Port Klang, not much wind, kinda slowed us down, but rewarded us instead with a beautiful sunset.

In between then and now, I was in a few club races, some highlights are we manage to have Sing hoe back sailing with us on platu, and we are leading the current platu series with Vincent taking helm. And on the last platu race on Sunday 23rd August 2009, it was really fun with us reclaiming the series leads after taking 2 bullets.

I am looking in to updating this blog more frequently now, with more details into our platu races.
and also more updates on our team development for the Malaysian Match Racing qualifier , we are proud to announce we have just confirm our participation after missing out last year.

RSYC Platu Series 31st May 2009

Today we have Wilson and Kok Fu with us, Wilson is a first timer while Kok Fu have had a few outings with us before, then we have Simon, yew and me. So with pik yi out of the picture we have an all guys crew, something we have not been for quite sometimes. I was thinking of a few bullets today; but we only got one out of three races

Race 1, The wind was blowing south west with windward mark at bearing 240; Wind was at 5-6 knots, but gusty at 8-9 knots,It was a bias starting line at boat; After screwing up a strings of starts 2 weeks ago; we were determine to get our record right; we had Tom barging from windward, and that spoils our start. Anyway south west wind is always shifty here. With all the boats regrouped close to each other at windward mark, we rounded it first and got the bullet.

Race 2, Again our starting line was screwed, this time by Aili's platu; anyway as we set off, we were leading until a shift changes everything. boats on the inside are now sailing higher than us, Tom , and Jeremy Camps. Jeremy rounded the windward mark first and never look back, as he took the bullet with us finishing second.

Race 3, We finally managed a good start, rounding the windward mark 1st, but in the downwind we allowed a separation, in which Jeremy took full advantage of, as they rounded the leeward mark 1st,
A few mistakes leaving the mark left us about 2-3 boats length further away, we manged to closed the gap; but still we finish with another second again today behind Jeremy.



With the Result; Jeremy now leads the RSYC Platu Series 2, on 18 points ,with us second also on 18 points.