Perpetual Mocean Takes Narrow Win In Pittwater
Newcastle Herald
Tuesday January 6, 2009
LAKE Macquarie sailor Mike Hamonet said there were no nervous moments on Perpetual Mocean as she took line honours over Pretty Woman by three-and-a-half minutes in the Pittwater to Coffs Harbour yacht race on Saturday.
Hamonet was a trimmer on the Sydney boat along with his son, Matthew, and fellow Lake Macquarie Yacht Club member Tom Freeman.The Bruce Hogan-owned Marten 49 finished the 226-nautical mile race in a time of 24 hours and 45 minutes at an average speed of just under 10 knots.It was first time Perpetual Mocean had been sailed in a long-distance ocean race.Hamonet has twice won the race on corrected time in his 30 years of sailing but has never finished with line honours.The Pittwater to Coffs Harbour is considered by many to be the second-biggest offshore yacht race in Australia after the Sydney to Hobart."The Pittwater to Coffs Harbour can be a more challenging race [than Hobart] because it's usually held at the time of year when you're held on the wind, but this year the south-easterly front came through on Thursday and it hung in all the way up here," Hamonet said."We were only three minutes ahead of the second boat [Pretty Woman]. "We basically had been sailing neck-and-neck with them since the start and got a bit of a break on them at Hacking Point at Port Macquarie when they went a little wide."We got the jump on them and were able to hold onto that."Perpetual Mocean's victory was the narrowest in the 28-year history of the race, but Hamonet said he was never doubtful his boat would triumph."Once we moved on them, and that happened pretty early on the Saturday morning, then it was just a matter of a drag race to the finish and we were always reasonably comfortable we'd be able to hold them to the finish," he said.
© 2009 Newcastle Herald
