7 dominates in lighter conditions

Seve Jarvin's extends at the 18ft skiff's JJ Giltinan Championship in Sydney

Defending champions Seve Jarvin, Sam Newton and Scott Babbage tightened their grip on the 2012 Giltinan 18ft Skiff Championship crown in Gotta Love It 7 when they absolutely destroyed the fleet in an awesome performance on Sydney Harbour today.

The team scored their third win from the four races sailed so far in the regatta and did it in such a manner that the winning margin was an incredible 5m 2s in the 8-12 knot southeast breeze.

Archie Massey, Dan Wilsdon and Mike McKensey finished second in Mojo Wine, a further 2m14s ahead of the third placed Smeg (Nick Press, Dan Phillips and Dave Ewings).

Appliancesonline.com.au (Micah Lane) was fourth, ahead of Yandoo (John Winning) and Rag & Famish Hotel (Jack Macartney).

Race 3 winner Thurlow Fisher Lawyers (Michael Coxon) failed to reproduce her previous boat speed and finished seventh more than 8½ minutes from the winner.

A number of protest hearings before the race gave ‘average points’ to Kenwood-Rabbitohs (Brett Van Munster) in race 1, Yandoo in race 2 and CST Composites (Howie Hamlin) and Pure Blonde (Tom Clout) in race 3.

The leading teams after four races are Gotta Love It 7 on 5 points, followed by Mojo Wine on 17, Appliancesonline.com.au on 18, Thurlow Fisher Lawyers 19, Smeg 21 and Rag & Famish Hotel 21.

In today’s race, the fleet split into two groups on the beat to the first windward mark in Rose Bay as some elected to go to the west of Shark Island while the rest went to the east side.

Gotta Love It 7 led the group which went to the west and the move was a winner as she led Mojo Wine by 25 seconds.

Thurlow Fisher Lawyers was a further 10 seconds back in third place ahead of a group including Asko Appliances (Marcus Ashley-Jones), Smeg, Appliancesonline, CST, Pure Blonde, Yandoo, De’Longhi-Rabbitohs (Simon Nearn) and C-Tech (Alex Vallings).

Although positions remained unchanged at the front of the fleet after the long spinnaker run from Rose Bay to Robertson Point, 7’s lead had increased a little, but the big change came on the following windward beat back to Clarke Island.

Gotta Love It 7’s margin had blown out to 1m50s over Mojo Wine, Appliancesonline, Smeg, Asko, Yandoo and Thurlow Fisher.

On the tight run to Chowder Bay, 7’s lead increased a little, however the loop from Chowder Bay (north) to Rose Bay (south) to Taylors Bay (north) and back to Rose Bay, Gotta Love It 7 stretched her margin to more than four minures.

As the breeze faded over the concluding stages 7 revelled in the conditions and increased her margin further to the 5m2s win.

The main centre of spectator attention was focused on the positional changes from third to eighth throughout the race.