RE: Australia's Easy Tiger Racing Team Ready To Roar at F18 Worlds in Long Beach, CA

MEDIA RELEASE
Long Beach, California, USA

Thursday 6 September 2012

 

Australia's Easy Tiger Racing Team Ready To Tear Strips at the F18 Catamaran Worlds

 

Easy Tiger Racing Team's Chris Way and Rod Waterhouse are set to compete in the 2012 Formula 18 Catamaran Worlds at Long Beach, California 8th-15th September, 2012.

 

The competition is expected to be hotter than ever among the 122 strong fleet that features some of the world's best multihull sailors including Olympian and America's Cup (Oracle Team USA) sailor, Darren Bundock (AUS), fancied local Olympic silver medalists Pease and Jay Glaser (USA) and 2011 F18 Australian Champion, Team Objective's Jason Waterhouse.

 

Easy Tiger's Formula 18 Racing Team is based at Pittwater on Sydney's Northern Beaches where the pair have been training on their Hobie Wildcat F18 in preparation for this event.

 

Team Tiger's Chris Way has had a great year so far in several one-design monohull classes. He won the Platu 25 Coronation Cup at the Top Of The Gulf Regatta in Thailand in May and narrowly missed out on podium finishes in both the Farr 40 and Melges 32 Australian Championships. Most recently he won Chester Race Week (Canada's largest annual keel boat regatta) in Canada on the J/111 Blast with a team of Eastern Canadian champions.

 

Skipper Rod Waterhouse, is a past Masters World Champion in the Hobie 16 class and a multiple Worrell 1000 Champion. The Worrell 1000 is a 1,000-mile beach catamaran race between South Beach, Florida and Virginia Beach, Virginia sailed on various classes of high performance multihulls.

 

"I've been itching to get back out on the F18 catamaran with Rod for some adrenalin fuelled multihull action after a season dominated by monohull racing. The goal for Rod and myself is to finish in the top ten and we're also going to have a crack at the Masters Title," Way said.

 

"The regatta venue is fantastic and we have chartered a brand new C2 catamaran (same design as current F18 world champion, Darren Bundock), so there are no excuses," he added

 

"The calibre of the fleet in this Worlds will be even better than last year in Hungary with the addition of some very good American and Argentinian sailors."

 

On the weekend, Way and Waterhouse finished 11^th among a fleet of 30 in the Labour Day Regatta hosted by the Alamitos Bay Yacht Club, Long Beach which essentially served as the pre-Worlds.

 

"We had two great days on the waters of San Pedro Bay. The wind conditions were nor' easterly sea breezes that built to 20 knots by the late afternoon with a bit of a swell and a choppy sea state. It made for some screaming downhill rides.

 

"We are getting used to the conditions. It has been a while since Rod and I have regularly sailed in 20 knots with such a sea state so it is taking a bit of getting used to."

 

The Formula 18 catamaran is an ISAF class 'box rule' 18-foot catamaran limited primarily by sail area and length. This dinghy is a two-man trapeze boat with spinnaker, self-tacking jib and high aspect main that is capable of reaching speeds up to 30 knots.

 

For all media enquiries, interview requests and images please contact Lulu Roseman, Ready About Communications on +61 (0) 477 046 837 or email lulu@readyabout.com.au

Photos of Chris Way/Rod Waterhouse Sail Number 392/Bow number 51

Please note all images are by Aron Szanto except for DSC4192 which is by Andrea Mag. Photos were taken at the F18 Worlds July 2011 in Hungary. 

Cheers

Lulu

Lulu Roseman
Ready About Communications
iPhone:  +61 477 046 837

Email:    lulu.roseman@gmail.com

Web:      http://www.readyabout.com.au

Skype:   lulu.roseman

F18s National Championships - On Sail-World

http://www.sail-world.com/Australia/The-Future-as-seen-by-2011-F18-Champ-Greg-Goodall/79747

Read About The Goodall's win In The Bendigo Advertiser

http://www.bendigoadvertiser.com.au/news/local/sport/sailing/title-win-a-family-affair/2059791.aspx

Final Results - Australian F18 National Championships 2011

Images from Day 3 Australian F18 Catamaran National Championships

F18 National Champions Reveal All

Winners are Grinners

What Greg and Brett Goodall said after winning their first Australian F18 National Champions.

Greg Goodall:

“It’s been a long time coming as we have been the maiden in five Nationals before and it was great to finally get across the line and win it.

“This was a good tough regatta with very trying conditions the whole time and the whole weekend.

“We started the regatta pretty badly with a 13^th in the first race on Saturday and we thought that wasn’t all bad as then we knew exactly where we shouldn’t be going on the course because we found every hole and every wrong way to go you could have found and we did that and then we won the next race followed by a second and a fifth.

“The next day we came out and had a three firsts and a fifth so that wasn’t bad for the day and that set us for being consistent. So that set us up and today that made it much harder the other guys to run us down as they had to put in brilliant performances while we had to put in just good solid results.”

Brett Goodall:

“Our success is due to the time we spend on the water and while we are sailing as father and son but once we get out the water we are team-mates. We’ve been sailing together for so long now, about six years, and we are in tune with each other. We really don’t talk that much as we just know where we are going and we just stick to the game plan and off we go.

Looking forward towards the World Championships in Hungary in July.

“It’s a real confidence booster to know that we are fast and that will definitely help us. We have raced in the World Championships for the past five years and are looking forward to competing. We will try and get some training in beforehand and just have another dip at it.”

What do you think might have given you the edge in this event?

“It would have to be Scotty Anderson’s steaks on the first night. I ate three steaks and five roast potatoes. He is a good mate who lives here in Gosford and he cooked us this beautiful BBQ after the first day’s racing so that may have been our secret weapon.”

Greg and Brett Goodall Crowned National Champions

The father and son combo, Greg and Brett Goodall who hail from Bendigo in Victoria have taken out the Australian F18 National Championships. Steve Brewin and Jack Benson (NSW) were the runners up followed by young guns Jason Waterhouse and Josh McKnight .

Adam Beashel and Grant Pellew jumped up to a respectable fourth place after getting a bullet in both the first and third race of the day.

Final Day

The final day of the Harken Zhik F18 Australian Championships kicks off today and the breeze is already in so this should make for a big day out on the water.

Currently we have done nine races and Greg and Brett Goddall have a 10 point lead on their C2 from Jason Waterhouse and Josh McKnight on the Wild Cat then five points back is current Australian Champion Steve Brewin and Jack Benson on a Capricorn.

There is a good chance we will get 3-4 more races in today giving us 12 or more races and bringing in two drops which might change a few things around in the results pending how everyone goes today.

Hope to have a few more photos tonight and we will get the results up as soon as possible after the racing.

Day 2 Australian F18 Catamaran National Championships

It was a tough day at the office for the 33 F18 fleet who completed five races today sailed under sunny skies and near perfect conditions.

The day started out with a 10-12  knot northerly breeze that built to a consistent 15 peaking at 18 knots by the last race causing a few nose dives and luckily not too much carnage.

The race committee did a sensational job squeezing five races and while the sailors might have been feeling the pain they relished the wind.

RE: Aust F18 Nationals Images of Day Two