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Ben (left) and Jake Hawker with the New Zealand Sunburst yachting trophy they won on Otago Harbour yesterday. Photo by Craig Baxter. |
Dunedin brothers Jake and Ben Hawker sailed away with the New
Zealand Sunburst title yesterday.
The Hawkers, aboard Embers, dominated the three-day regatta
on Otago Harbour to become the first all-Dunedin crew to win
the title.
The Macandrew Bay brothers won five of the eight races and
had a second place and two sixths.
Bruce Yarnton (Good News), from the Wakatere club, was second
overall with a first, two seconds, a third, a fourth, a fifth
and a seventh.
John Kliffen (Plum Crazy), from Worser Bay, was third with a
first, two seconds, a fourth, two sixths and a seventh.
Pleasant Point yachtsman Craig Tomlinson, on Meindad, won the
handicap title.
Jake (25) and Ben (22) Hawker benefited from local knowledge
but their main asset was team-work, Yachting New Zealand
regional support representative Graeme Wall said.
''They've sailed together quite a while and they know each
other well,'' Wall said.
''You've got to be consistent in a regatta like this, and
they prepared the boat well and approached it as a
campaign.''
The Hawkers had never previously won the title but had
finished as high as second.
Yachts struck blustery conditions over the weekend, when six
races were held. Twenty-nine yachts started the regatta and
only 19 were still going by the end of the third race. One
suffered a broken boom and another a snapped mast, Wall said.
The two races yesterday were held in much better conditions.
''It was a perfect day. We had nice sunshine, and 8-10 knots.
Really nice,'' Wall said.
The event will return to the North Island next year and Wall
said the host club, once chosen, would have to meet the
standard set by the Port Chalmers club over the weekend.
''It was a very good regatta, on the water and on shore. The
clubhouse was humming.''
Dunedin's Hayden Whitburn, aged 14 at the time, won the
Sunburst title in 1999 as crew for a Canterbury captain.
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