Casio successfully defend

The NSW 18ft Skiff Championship has come to a close

Michael Coxon and his Casio Seapathfinder 18ft Skiff team successfully defended their NSW Championship when they took victory in the final race of the 2005-2006 season championship on Sydney Harbour on Sunday.

Coxon, Aaron Links and Nathan Ellis recovered from a slow start in Sunday's race to defeat Club Marine (Euan Mc Nicol) by 18 seconds with De Longhi (Grant Rollerson) a further 21 seconds back in third place.

The win gave Casio Seapathfinder a final total for the championship of six points.

Second overall was Rag & Famish Hotel (John Harris) on ten points. Third was Club Marine on 14 points, followed by Omega Smeg (Daniel Phillips) on 16, CST Composites (Chris Dixon) on 21 and Asko Appliances (Hugh Stodart) on 26.

The race was sailed in a 12-15 knot South East breeze and as happened in almost every race so far this season, the fleet split into two groups shortly after the start.

It was soon evident that the group on the left hand side of the course, headed by De Longhi, had done better as the groups met near Shark Island.

At the windward mark De Longhi held an eight second lead over Club Marine, closely followed by Maytag, Appliances Online, Rag & Famish Hotel, Asko and Omega Smeg. Casio was a long way from the lead.

Club Marine grabbed the lead downwind and continued to hold a 25 second break over De Longhi when the fleet went around the Clarke Island mark.

Club Marine extended her lead on the spinnaker run but was under pressure from Rag & Famish and Casio as they headed for Rose Bay.

Casio had trailed Rag & Famish around the previous mark but had superior height and speed over Rag & Famish going into Rose Bay.

Club Marine continued to lead at Rose Bay with Casio second and Rag & Famish third, but the championship was decided immediately after rounding when the Rag capsized as the crew attempted to set their extra.

Casio took the lead from Club Marine over the loop between Rose Bay and Taylor Bay and held out the Giltinan champion team to take race and championship honours.

Results:

Pos	Skiff	Handicap Place	Final NSW C'ship Points
1	Casio Seapathfinder	5	6 (1st)
2	Club Marine	1	14 (3rd)
3	De Longhi	2	33
4	Omega Smeg	4	16
5	Ssangyong Yandoo	6=	29
6	Maytag	3	30
7	Rag & Famish Hotel	13	10 (2nd)
8	Asko Appliances	10	26
9	CST Composites	12	21
10	Active Air	6=	45
11	Appliances Online	8	44
12	Toshiba	11	71
13	Panasonic	9	48
14	SX Projects	14	65
15	Wentworth Courier	15	69
16	Southern Cross Constructions	16	58