2023-24 Vic States

26 November 2023

A strong fleet of Victorian fireballs headed to Cairn Curran for the 2023-24 Victorian State titles. The forecast was for light winds and rain, but the fireballers were undeterred.  Luckily most rain fell on the Friday night during a thunderstorm that took out the local power.  By the morning everything was fine with a 15-20 knot NW blowing across course. The racing was close but Brendan Garner and Ben O’Brien showed their form and cleared out on the three races.  Unfortunately for them a broken spinnaker halyard enabled Heather Macfarlane / Chris Payne to win the 2nd race.  Nick Gunner / Simon Gunner were also fast in the conditions and kept Brendan and Ben honest.  

Day 2 was 10-15 knots from the south and again brought close racing through out the strong fleet. Heather and Chris managed to win the first race which set up a winner takes all in the 2nd and last race of the series. With a close first beat throughout the fleet Brendan and Ben led around the first mark and sailed away for a comfortable win and back to back state championships.  Glen Peverell and Bruno Lanati showed speed and good tactics to push the leaders hard, but Phil Peverell and Bruce Shand showed consistency across the two days to finish 3rd.

Full results can be found here

A big shout out to Cairn Curran Sailing Club for allowing us to use their wonderful lake for our state titles, and provide great wine, food, sticky date pudding and wonderful hospitality.  It is always a highlight of the season. and we look forward to coming back next year.

photo by Will Baum - Peter and Seb Durran going upwind just ahead of Susannah Gillam / Andrew Butler