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It took Tim Jacobs 19 km and almost an hour
and a half of brutal effort to take the lead from Jeremy Cotter in the first
downwind race of the Ocean Series.
 Jeremy Cotter powers away at the start
The 21 km Narrabeen Beach Challenge, held
last weekend, proved to be a hard-fought battle that tested even the toughest
competitors. Instead of the howling
north easterly swell that we were all hoping for, conditions were small and
choppy, with a light ENE breeze picking up during the race. Although there were runs, you had to work
hard for them, and they didn't give you any rest once you were on them.
Great
Turnout
It was another great turnout, with almost
100 paddlers on the start line. Race
organisers experimented with a slightly different start for this race - doing a
le
mans start, standing in the water, running up to
your ski on the beach, turning and dragging your ski back in. The front group sprinted off the start like
it was a 500m race and opened up a gap from the rest of the pack very early on. This pack, led by Jeremy Cotter, also
contained David Rhodes and Simon Martin, both of whom had just returned from
altitude training with the Australian kayak team. If you could hang on, it created a very handy
lead going into the 19km downwind stretch.
As soon as the pack rounded Barrenjoey
Headland, everyone seemed to split up - many going wide thinking that they
would take advantage of the ENE runs, with some taking a more inside line along
the beach. This decision would prove to
be critical. Tim Jacobs, who had lost
about 100m at the start due to weed on his rudder, was able to make up ground
surfing the small, fast runs inshore, while the guys out to sea battled in the
cross-chop. Spectators watching from the
headland say they were amazed to see Tim Jacobs (in his bright yellow ‘self
appointed leader's jersey') and Mark Minchin overtaking paddler after paddler
just due to the line that they took.
10km
to go
With 10km to go, Jeremy Cotter was leading,
from Dave Kissane, Nick Holt and David Rhodes, with Mark Minchin and Tim Jacobs
not far behind. The last 10 km was
pretty much with the runs, with no real advantage based on the line. In the end though, Tim proved too strong, passing
Jeremy with a kilometre to go to take out race number 3. Jeremy raced a very impressive race
considering the speed at which he took off at the start and his relatively
limited experience in the ocean skis, and managed to hang on to second
place. It was a very tough race for all
competitors, which will have some people re-evaluating their training
strategies going into the Perth World Cup and Twenty Beaches
races in December (bearing in mind that the Twenty Beaches will be the
identical course, only 8km longer).
Ladies
Race
In the girls race (which I have very rudely
been neglecting in these reports), Katrina Wilkinson won her second race in a
row, but is still placed behind Kelly Jury and Emma Crawford Parsons in the
overall standings. Gary David and Darren
Lee won the doubles race for the third consecutive time, coming in 5th
overall.
Dubai
Both Jeremy Cotter and Tim Jacobs are
heading to Dubai
at the end of the month - and both are fit, fast and hungry for a win against
the international guys. With win number
three under his belt, Tim is now pretty much assured of a spot in the Aussie
team heading to Durban
for the World Cup 2008. Jeremy Cotter
and Dave Kissane look fairly comfortable in second and third overall in the
series, but with two races to go, don't discount Dean Gardiner, Dane Sloss or
David Rhodes from taking one of the three spots in the team. We're now nearing the business end of the
ocean racing season in Sydney, with the Manly
Wharf Hotel King of the Harbour race on 25 November and the Twenty Beaches
on 15 December. Based on the
performances so far, and the quality of paddlers in the field, if I were the
South African / Tahitian / US paddlers, I wouldn't be too quick to discount the
Aussies in the lead-up Dubai and Perth.
See also: http://www.manlydaily.com.au/article/2007/11/13/7318_sports.html
Results Summary
1st Tim Jacobs 1.29.09
2nd Jeremy Cotter 1.29.48
3rd David Kissane 1.30.31
4th David Rhodes 1.31.20
5th Gary David/Daren Lee 1.31.25
6th Mark Mitcham 1.32.22
7th Nick Holt 1.33.24
8th Mark Anderson 1.33.46
9th Simon Martin 1.34.17
10th Jamie Stewart 1.34.30
47th Katrina Wilkinson 1.48.38
53rd Kelly Druey 1.50.21
Full results: http://www.oceanseries.com.au/events/20071111/ski/overall%20placings%20narrabeen.pdf
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