There was a joyous mood apparent across the fleet that turned out for last Sunday’s (12/01/2025) Port Macquarie Yacht Club river race when after one yacht voiced, “well at least we’re going to podium” there were peals of raucous, almost riotous laughter on adjacent yachts during a surprisingly eventful pre-start.

When the laughter subsided, and the jockeying for the start began it was Cool Change’s crew who had most issues with laughter induced incapacity and eventually somewhat missed the start. The other podium yachts, Zig Zag and Third Man made the most of the situation and took off down the course with Zig Zag taking the lead by the top turning mark on the river “A” course.

PMYC rules require that there are at least three starters to constitute a race, with the low turnout of only three yachts being surprising, given that it was the final hitout before the annual inshore regatta scheduled for the same course next weekend and the Australia Day regatta the weekend following, both prestigious local events.

It was no surprise that light airs specialist Zig Zag took and held the lead, followed by the other two starters in processional mode, with Third man leading Cool Change around the course. In light and fluky winds that failed to reach ten knots, OOD Teddy Clausen elected not to shorten the course, but rather to require yachts to take and submit their individual lap times, a prudent decision as in a dying breeze Cool Change found itself unable to complete the scheduled two laps and submitted a single lap time that was extrapolated out to two laps to provide the predicted podium result, with Third Man taking first place and taking an impressive early season pointscore lead, Zig Zag taling second and moving up to forth on the pointscore, while Cool Change finished third on the day to protect it second place on overall standings.

Next Sunday’s PMYC inshore regatta, is expected to attract more yachts and provde close racing, again on the Hastings River “A” course.