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Six of Tasmania’s best women skippers and their crews will line up on Saturday, 23 May, for the annual Sargison Jewellers Women’s Fleet Racing Regatta on the River Derwent. Sailing the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania’s fleet of Elliott 5.9 sports boats, the all-women crews, sailing either three or four-up, will sail between three and seven short races.
Helmswomen who have lodged nominations with the RYCT so far include Gemma Mincke, Jessie Atherton, Lisa Guy, Esme Van Wick and Lisa Blackwood. While most of the women skippers and their crews have had considerable experience in keelboat racing, Jessie Atherton and her crew are from the International Mirror dinghy fleet at Kingston Beach Sailing Club. While lacking keelboat sailing experience, the three sailors have a wealth of expertise in sailing the Mirror dinghy, with class ‘veteran’ and internationally successful Jenny Graney joining teenage champions Jessie Appleton and Katherine Maher. Jenny, a mother of three adult daughters, has been sailing in the popular Mirror class (there are some 73,000 boats registered worldwide) since she was a teenager and is a World Masters champion as crew. Jesse, now aged 18 and a medical student at UTAS, two seasons ago became the first woman to win a Mirror National championship as skipper, with Katherine, now aged 16 and still at college, her crew. They finished second in this year’s championship in Sydney. This coming Sunday will also see the first race in the RYCT Winter Pennant Series with four divisions competing in this popular three-sail competition. “There will be Winter centre course racing each Sunday, with each of the senior keelboat clubs taking it in turns to conduct the racing for their own pennant series,” said sailing manager Nick Corkhill. “A yacht may enter for the RYCT Winter pennant races every third Sunday, but if they wish to race each Sunday then they must enter each club’s pennant series,” he explained. – Peter Campbell 
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