Diabo News
Awesome events, venues and people
My 2008 season started with two wonderful events; the Caribbean Sailing Regatta and the Hobie Tiger & Dragoon Worlds in South Africa. On February 1st, I checked in with about 120 men! Our destination was St. Martin, from where we would race to the BVI over the night. This private, annual Caribbean Sailing Regatta is only open to men. The participating teams consist of friends and the concept is simple: six days of racing through different Caribbean areas on identical 51.5 ft. Mooring yachts, beautiful lagoons, culinary diners or lunches in top restaurants, happy hours, breakfast with sea breeze, beach parties and lots of humour. It was my job to capture all the exciting moments onshore and on the water, both as a photographer and writer. The organization will publish a book, that will keep the memory alive. I also wrote a small article about private regatta’s for Dutch yachting magazine Nautique.
My next trip started on February 27th, despite my full program of writing articles and reporting on the Dutch performances at the Tornado Worlds. I flew to Cape Town to participate at and work for the Hobie Tiger & Hobie Dragoon Worlds 2008 in Langebaan. Racing commenced on Monday March 3rd and finished on Saturday March 8th. In total, 63 Tiger and 25 Dragoon teams lined up for these championships. Especially the Tiger fleet showed very close competition in mostly windy conditions. Australia and South Africa won the 2008 titles. It was a nerve breaking final morning for the leaders in both fleets, as the lack of wind kept them waiting. The first attempt on the Dragoon course was cancelled after the wind died completely. At about 1 pm, the race committee dropped the postponement flag and all catamarans left the beach. When the Tigers finally managed to start clean, Mark Laruffa and Daniel Sims (AUS) lost initially their golden position, but they fought back and won the title. The final race for the Dragoons could not be sailed anymore, due to the long postponement. That means that at the time limit of 3 pm, Matt Whitehead and Megan Du Plessis (RSA) were declared the new Hobie Dragoon World Champions. Matt’s mum Tracy Whitehead did a wonderful job on organizing the event. Stuart Gummer and I finished 14th overall, which made me happy. After the sailing, I went straight to my room to start writing the daily press release. I found it again a big plus to combine racing with reporting, so I think this is a perfect approach.
The press release were picked up by many media, including the Daily Sail, Yachts & Yachting, Dinghy Sailing Magazine, ISAF, Voiles News (thanks to the translations by Isabelle), Multihull World Australia, Multicoques Mag, Scuttlebutt, etc. Photographer Pierrick Contin did again a fantastic job, which resulted in great shots.
Tiger – Final Overall Results
2 NED M.Booth/T.Baring-Gould Total pts: 50 (11,4,2,4,5,2,6,7,4,4,3,9)
3 AUS R.Lovig/L.Gibson Total pts: 53 (3,1,3,3,4,11,64,4,3,12,4,5)
4 NED M.Heemskerk/B.Tentij Total pts: 55 (4,11,7,2,1,5,8,1,64,1,13,2)
5 RSA S.Ferry/J.Van Der Vyfer Total pts: 65 (1,2,5,10,64,6,9,3,8,8,9,4)
6 BEL C.Brouwer/D.Bundock Total pts: 72 (17,8,6,64,16,1,2,2,6,6,2,6)
7 RSA D.Ross/R.Nankin Total pts: 96 (6,7,8,14,18,4,12,17,1,64,8,1)
8 RSA A.Lawrence/I.Schabort Total pts: 99 (16,5,12,5,6,18,1,12,64,2,10,12)
9 RSA B.Dodds/P.Dodds Total pts: 103 (9,16,4,17,8,20,10,10,7,9,6,7)
10 RSA H.Hale/S.Botes Total pts: 114 (7,13,17,7,12,10,7,13,5,11,12,17)
Dragoon – Final Overall Results
2 RSA E.Erasmus/R.Suttner -Scalco Total pts: 18 (2,1,3,6,6,1,1,1,3)
3 NED G.Schouten/T.Schouten Total pts: 23 (5,2,2,3,1,2,8,3,5)
4 RSA P.Smith/E.Loubser Total pts: 25 (4,6,2,2,1,2,2,14,6)
5 RSA D.McLean/S.Du Plessis Total pts: 27,2,8,7,3,2,4,4,3,2)
For photographs, more results and reports, surf to http://www.hobieworlds.com/.
The Hague, April 3rd 2008
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