2016 Royal Malta Yacht Club’s Calendar comes to a close.

Seventeen, fully crewed yachts took part in the Royal MaltaYacht Club’s final race of the year, an annual appointment that is kept by manyreturning crews for the Medcomms Round Malta Race.

The course chosen was to take the yachts on a southerlyroute leaving the Munxar Cardinal buoy to starboard then on around Malta viathe South Comino channel to finish at Marsamxett.  Yachts started in two groups into a moderateEast South Easterly breeze with grey clouds looming.

Four yachts started at 08:31 in the cruiser class, withInspiration getting their timing quite right and being first off the line.However the much larger, and newest addition to the fold, Miame Too soonovertook to windward and led the fleet out to the first mark.

The twelve IRC Class 1 & 2 yachts started about nineminutes later with a couple of very close calls while tacking out ofMarsamxett.  The fleet soon spread outand by Munxar it was Xpedite, Elusive II, Unica and Xpresso that dominated theorder. The pace was above average with the wind keeping the yachts very much a straightcourse close to the rhumb line.  

The first IRC Class 1 yacht to cross the finish line was Xpediteat 13:59 followed by Elusive II at 14:00 with Xpresso close behind at 14:01.Ratings came into play at the eventual order after time corrections it wasElusive II to clinch first place, followed by Unica and Xpresso in second andthird place respectively with just nine minutes separating the first and third.

The first IRC Class 2 yacht over the line was Seawolf of Southamptonat 14:43 followed by Puddleduck at 14:50. Sailaway crossed at 15:00. There wasno change to this order even after time corrections were calculated.

The IRC Class 4 had three boats competing with final placinggoing to Manana then Inspiration and Janissah. The new Miame Too was in a class of its own in the RMYC Cruiser.

“The Medcomms Round Malta Race closes off a hectic racingcalendar and we are pleased to see that racers had a great time on the water –we take this opportunity to thank Medcomms for their ongoing support as well asthe volunteers who assisted in race management” remarked Godwin Zammit,Commodore, and Royal Malta Yacht Club. “We now look forward to a short breakfrom racing, however we do look forward to the annual Boxing Day Fun Race thatwill be held in aid of L-Istrina, and hope that as is the norm quite a goodamount of our members will turn up on the day to support this charitablecause”.

The Royal Malta Yacht Club’s 2017 Racing Calendar will kickoff on the 21st January with the start of the Malta Sailing League.More information can be found on www.rmyc.org.

Results

IRC Class 1

1st Place – Elusive II (Aaron, Christoph & Maya Podesta)

2nd Place – Unica (Jamie Sammut)

3rd Place – Xpresso (Sean Borg)

IRC Class 2

1st Place – Seawolf (David Latham)

2nd Place – Puddleduck (Chris Selvagi)

3rd Place – Sailaway (Ray Schembri)

IRC Class 4

1st Place – Manana (Peter Ellul Vincenti)

2nd Place – Inspiration (Godwin Zammit)