Lazarus Capital Partners, the latest sponsor to join the strong Australian 18 Footers League s fleet, has linked up with one of the new, young teams setting out on their challenge to become one of the best on Sydney Harbour.
The new team, the youngest in the fleet, is 20-year-old Lachlan Steel (skipper), 22-year-old Jerome Watts, on the sheet, and 20-year-old Matt Doyle in the bow.
Their journey together began in November, during the Spring Championship, when the three crew first carried the company logo on the skiff s sails.
Lachlan, Jerome and Matt have sailed the past three seasons together on the 16ft skiff, ADCO , in the St George fleet but, despite their successes in the 16s, realise that their first season together in the 18s won t be easy.
Winning Group wins Race 4 of NSW 18 Footers Championship 14 December 2020
The 2020-2021 NSW Championship continued to produce some of the best 18ft Skiff action seen on Sydney Harbour for several seasons when the defending champion Winning Group team of John Winning Jr., Seve Jarvin and Sam Newton hung on grimly to score a narrow win in Race 4 of the championship today.
After grabbing the lead at the start, the Winning Group led for the entire course but had to hold off a strong challenge from the Finport Finance team of Keagan York, Phil Marshall and Matt Stenta, to score an exciting 4s victory in the light ENE wind.
With a decision still pending about the outcome of the abandoned Race 2 of the NSW 18ft Skiff Championship, the series is in an unusually unclear position as it goes into Race 4 on Sydney Harbour next Sunday.
As a five-race championship, each team can discard its worst performance, but as a four-race series there is no provision for a discard so the decision will have an impact on the points table as many teams, including the defending champion Winning Group, currently have large discards.
That aside, the first three race days have produced a wide variety of conditions. Race 1 was sailed in a 7-15-knot NE wind, Race 2 was abandoned when 40-knot (plus) winds swept over the course, then last Sunday a 20-knot Westerly wind tested the fleet.