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ILCA 6 Action Mara Stransky Leads Evie Saunders & Hugo Ralph Photo by Spikey Mikey

The Oceania & Australian Youth & Open Championships was held at Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron Manly Queensland 1-8 January 2025. The event saw 223 boats in the three ILCA classes sail in five fleets competing all 12 scheduled races in mostly variable sea breeze conditions. The first day saw very strong SE winds with the second race of the day abandoned when a 35 knot front moved over the course. There races were scheduled on the second day with PRO Col Dods keen to get back onto the regatta schedule. This day proved to be the toughest of the regatta.
Days 3 to 6 were sailed in predictable moderate seas breeze conditions allowing the event to proceed like clockwork give or take a few general recalls.

Almost all the top Australian ILCA sailors were competing along with sailors from 10 other countries in Oceania, North America, Europe and Asia regions. In particular It was great to see eight sailors from New Zealand and representatives from Samoa and Fiji competing. The story of two special Pacific Island Olympic sailors is outlined in an ILCA Oceania press release Here.

Action a Plenty in the ILCA 4s at RQYS

It was great to see the large number of ILCA 4 sailors. ILCA 4s were the largest class with 92 entries (47 females) sailing for the first time in two fleets. In a close contest they were lead home by Tinaroo Queenslander Breanne Wadley RQYS/TSC from Victorian Callum Simmons SSCBC/IHYC who was first Under 18 and Singaporean Ian Goh. First Under 16 was overall 4th placed WA sailors Thomas Cooper RFBYC/FSC.

The ILCA 6s had 85 entries sailing in two fleets. They were dominated by the top women sailors with 8 of the top 10 and all of the top 6 places filled by women. The clear winner was RQYS and Tokyo Olympic representative Mara Stransky. Mara overcame a F3 race retirement due to a second Rule 42 infringement with a strong finish to win from Marseille Olympic representative WA’s Zoe Thomson RFBYC. NSW Manly YC sailor Evie Saunders won three races to finish 3rd and was first Under 21. NSW sailors Healy Ryan DBSC/HHSC was first Under 17 and first male at 7th place. First Under 19 was WA’s Jasper Stay RFBYC/FSC.

Hamish Gilsenan Leads Mike Wilson in ILCA 7

The ILCA 7s fleet of 46 podium was dominated by WA sailors with four of the top six from that state. Zac Littlewood RFBYC won after a first place in the final heat. Zac received a second yellow flag in the first race of the final day setting the scene for a nail biting finish with Netherlands Olympic sailor Duko Bos. Zac’s win in Race 12 got him across the line on a countback. Ethan McAulay RPYC who had beaten Zac and Duko in the lead up event Sail Melbourne was well placed until a second yellow flag in Race 9 forced him to withdraw from that race. Ethan finished 3rd. WA sailors Stefan Elliott-Shircore FSC and Michael Compton SoPYC/FSC completed the WA domination with NSW sailor Finn Alexander RSYS/DBSC completing the podium places. First Under 21 in the ILCA 7s was Isaac Schotte RQYS.

The Battens Trophy for the best performing state returned to WA where it has resided for most of its life since 1975. Victoria in 2023 and Queensland in 2024 interrupted the line however the fabulous strength of the WA ICLA 7 team carried the day in 2025.

Winners are Grinners – Battens Winning Team

The next ILCA Australian & Oceania Open & Youth Championships will be held at the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania 1-8 January 2026. Information on this event is in a post on our web site Here.

The full results of the event are Here.
All the event details are on the competitors page on the RQYS web site Here.
RQYS event photos are Here.
There is a more detailed wrap on he event by Andrew Stransky Here.

For longer term planning the 2026 Oceania & Australian and Open & Youth Championships will be 1-8 January 2026 at  the Royal Yacht Club of Tasmania in Hobart.

As always sailors will be made very welcome and experience great sailing conditions. Sailors and their supporters can also enjoy some of Australia’s best tourist venues before or after the event. You can get the picture in the short promo video Here.

It is best to plan well ahead for events in Tassie as it is a very popular destination especially around Christmas and New Year. ILCA Tasmania have set up a special page on the RTCT web site Here which will have all the information on the event.

At the AIS Awards Ceremony Casey Imeneo, Alistair Murray, Grae Morris, Matt Wearn and Emma Plasschaert

At the top of sport, and not just sailing – Matt Wearn OAM and Grae Morris were celebrated at the 2024 Australian Sports Performance Awards held in Melbourne 11 December 2024. Matt was up against Olympic champions Cameron McEvoy (Swimming Australia) and Keegan Palmer (Skate Australia) in the prestigious Male Able-Athlete of the Year category.

Men’s Windsurfing Olympic silver medallist, Grae Morris was a finalist for Emerging Athlete of the Year an award won by Arisa Trew for her impressive skateboard gold medal winning performance at Paris 2024.

Ahoy folks, the AGM of ILCA Australia Inc. will be held at Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron Brisbane at 9.00am AEST 5th January 2025.

The Agenda, Special Resolutions and Executive Reports for the meeting are Here.

Minutes of 2024 AGM in Adelaide are Here.

Come along, hear how the class is being administered and have your say.

There will be a Zoom hook up available. Details are in the Agenda.

ILCA Oceania is delighted to announce the following sailors have been selected by their district as the Solidarity representative for 2025 program run during the 2025 Oceania & Australian Open & Youth Championships at RQYS 1-8 January.

This program encourages young female sailors (ages 13-16) to participate in a world-class sailing championship and aims to foster a lasting love for sailing among young girls and support their development within the sport.

This is the third year of the program and already some participants have transitioned to the ILCA 6 and participated in subsequent State & National events.

This year local builder PSA have come on board and very generously will provide charter boats and merchandise for all the sailors. Australian Sailing are also providing much appreciated support for the program.

Thanks to the ILCA districts for their support, and for managing the selection process.

The full ILCA Oceania Press Release is Here.

Australian ILCA builder Performance Sailcraft Australia PSA has been purchased from long term owner the Spencer family of New Zealand.

The new owner is Jersey domiciled fintech entrepreneur Nick Ogden. Nick has a team busy re-establishing production and distribution having been approved by ILCA International as an ILCA builder. One of now nine worldwide.

We understand that under new owner PSA is in the process of;

• Setting up a new factory on the Central Coast of NSW
• Obtaining new ILCA standard molds and joining jig so all world builders will have molds from the same master
• Retaining experienced PSA ILCA building skilled staff
• Establishing a state based dealer network to support sales and the class

It will take time for fabrication, stocking and normal service to be establish following the sale of stock and closure of the old factory at Fountaindale.

The RRS are very comprehensive and can be difficult to navigate let alone memorise.

Stuart Holdsworth has created a Chat GPT to help out sailors, race committees and protest committees. In this fee AI driven rules sailing assistant you just ask it questions and give it scenarios and it gives an analysis of the relevant rules.

Its purpose is to educate sailors and help avoid unnecessary protests or disputes.

Many, even expert sailors have been blown away by it and it is now the first point of reference for many when facing rules based incidents.

The link to the Chat GPT is

https://chatgpt.com/g/g-7FhRw3LWg-racing-rules-of-sailing-assistant

You need to sign into Chat GPT with Google, Apple or Microsoft IDs or create a GPT account. This is free to use.