Happy & Safe Easter to all!

Wishing all RPAYC Members and their families a very happy and safe Easter. Halyards Bistro will be open for breakfast and lunch from Easter Saturday - Easter Monday, (closed Good Friday) so please drop in for a coffee or bite to eat!

Easter Holiday Weekend - Club Trading Hours
Good Friday - Friday 19 April - Club CLOSED
Easter Saturday - 20 April - Halyards Open 8am - 3pm
Easter Sunday - 21 April - Halyards Open 8am - 3pm
Easter Monday - 22 April - Halyards Open 8am - 3pm
** Bar Hours are trade dependant **

Entries for the 2019 Middle Harbour Yacht Club Women's Regatta are now open!

The Open Keelboat divisions will be contested by yachts with all female crews and mixed crews with a female helm. One Design divisions for mixed crews with a female helm are available for Adams 10, Melges 20, Yngling, J24 and Elliott 7 classes with a minimum of 3 entries. Join us back at MHYC after racing for live music, prize giving and a pamper station with the SmoothFM Angels!

Enter online or find notice of race HERE
For more information, head to Sail World HERE
Or register your interest in crewing for the day with the MySail Crew register - click here

Special thanks to our sponsors Helly Hansen, Smooth FM, MySail and Chandon

The Young 88 Class Pittwater Regatta 2019 has concluded with 6 races being completed over the fantastic 2 day event.

RPA’s Brian Ellis and his crew onboard VENUE took 1st on PHS and won the ‘Chinnock Trophy’ whilst fellow RPA Sailor Simon Grosser ( YOUNG AT HEART) and Team were first on scratch and recorded an impressive score of 1,1,2,(3),2,1, with their name being inscribed on the ‘Gunga Din Sword’ as the scratch winner.

PHS Results
1st - Venue - Brian Ellis (RPAYC)
2nd - Diamond Day - Jonathan Turner (RMYC)
3rd - Young at Heart - Simon Grosser (RPAYC)

Scratch Results
1st - Young at Heart - Simon Grosser (RPAYC)
2nd - Agent 88 - Stephen Ellis (RSYS)
3rd - Pistol Dawn - Malcolm Thompson (BSC)

Race Results - Click Here

Your Club is hosting the Annual Club Marine Pittwater Sail Expo on the weekend of 27th-28th April and we seek your assistance with parking for members and visitors over the weekend. 

 
We anticipate another successful Sail Expo weekend with 1,800-2,000 visitors and the Club is also running a SOP’s race on Saturday.  In addition, our new Head Chef, Michael Roper, will showcase his talent with an a-la-carte pop-up restaurant; Alfred’s Restaurant will be open for dinner on Friday and both lunch and dinner on Saturday and Sunday.  For more casual dining, Halyards will also be open.
 
To maximise parking, we ask that:

• Members not park in the lower or middle car park overnight on Friday 26th, Saturday 27th or Sunday 28th April.
• Unless you are volunteering at Sail Expo, visiting the event or sailing in the offshore race on Saturday, please park your vehicle on the top level or in the Crystal Bay car park.
• If you regularly keep your car parked in the lower, middle or top car park, please park it at the Crystal Bay car park over the weekend.
• If you are going away for an extended period over Easter and your vehicle will be onsite over the Sail Expo weekend, please park your vehicle at the Crystal Bay car park.

Thanks for your understanding and assistance.

The annual ‘Old Timers’ Race with an 'Old Timer' Member at the helm, got off in a 6 knot westerly and was quite a sight with 26 boats on the start line (some a little too close). Pittwater played its usual trick between Long Nose & Soldiers Point with an East/Westerly blowing, keeping everyone second guessing their decisions. Pretty Woman took advantage of having the tallest mast in the fleet and managed to connect the dots well enough to take both Line Honours and Handicap Wins. 

Everyone then returned to the club for the Luncheon which saw 138 Members exchange tails and enjoy Club comradeship. A highlight was the fillet steak overseen by our new head chef who is already winning hearts through peoples stomachs. The hostly contentested and sometimes trivial 'Old Timers Quiz' was this year won by Team Leeroy Brown, by a rather large margin of 29 points. The joint wooden spoon of Trivia who shall remain nameless, both finished on 9 points and earned a commissary beverage. 

This year's race winners were:
1st: Pretty Woman - Bruce Staples
2nd: Bombolo - David Warren
3rd: Baragoola - Arthur Spithill

Race Results - Click Here

The Club is committed to keeping our waterways clean and in doing so is supporting Archie Mandin and the Seabin initiative as well as engaging our Members and the broader sailing community to be responsible on water. 

• Seabin will be in action on A arm from the Sail Expo weekend 27-28 April - come down and see it in action.
• Archie will be around over the Sail Expo weekend to meet members and discuss the Seabin and his own passion to keep our waterways clean.

Who is Archie? My name is Archie Mandin and  I am a Seabin Ambassador. I started this campaign because I want to take a stand against ocean plastics!

My goal is to raise enough money to bring a minimum of 20 Seabins to Pittwater NSW as I want to give The Northern Beaches the opportunity to reduce its plastic pollution impact on the ocean. Its amazing how much accidental rubbish comes down our creeks and into our waterways. 

I am going around to all the Marinas and offering a $ for $ option. 

If they put $3,000.00 in my Campaign I will find the other $3,000.00 from the community, as its our rubbish coming from creeks and drains that end up in the marinas as they act as catch points, each bin costs $6,000.00.

The first one is now paid for and going to homeport marina. Each Bin gets a school attached, they will monitor and collect data, it will be exciting to see the results.  

I need your help to raise money along the way. The Seabins a revolutionary ocean cleaning technology which is essentially a floating rubbish bin that operates 24/7 catching all floating debris in the water. Visit my GoFundMe website Here.

The Seabin helps clean the ocean of floating debris which in turn creates cleaner oceans and we all benefit from this in one way or another. I mean, who really wants to swim in pollution? Not me that’s for sure!

Did you know that 300 million tons of plastic are produced in the world every year, half of which is for single use products, from this more than 8 million tons of plastic is dumped into our oceans every year. We need to do something about it and now with the purchase of a Seabin we can all participate and make a difference! 

Join me and my campaign to help ensure cleaner oceans!

Some of our amazing centreboard sailing were off racing at the 50th Trofeo Princesa Sofia in Palma, SPAIN. 

Congratulations to: 

* Jason Waterhouse & Lisa Darmanin (NACRA 17)  - 1st Place 

* Tash Bryant & Annie Wilmot (49er fx) - 21st Place

* Chris Charlwood & Josh Dawson (470) - 17th Place

* Jim Colley & Shaun Conner (49er) - 41st Place

Full results here

Chris Way and his team of Murray Gordon, Tom Spithill, Mark Dorling, Katie Pellew & Andrew Hudson travelled to Long Beach, USA to compete in the Ficker Cup. Eight teams from around the globe competed in the 40th Ficker Cup match race: three days of what Principal Race Officer John Busch called, "Awesome, epic sailing." Although the wind was slow to come up in the morning, when it did fill in, it was idyllic, with cool ocean breezes and plenty of sunshine. 

The team, which were the only newcomers to the event and to the Catalina 37's, had a strong 2 days of racing and narrowly missed the Semi Finals by 1 point. They are already hopeful to return next year and fight for the win in the Ficker Cup and to qualify for the Congressional Cup. 

Full Results can be seen here

A fleet of 11 boats set off for Port Stephens in a light northerly on Saturday morning with Mark Griffith's Showtime taking the early lead and going on to take the hat trick of:

* Line Honours
* IRC
* ORCi
* PHS

Race 7 - PHS 
1st: Showtime: Mark Griffith
2nd: Dreki Sunnan: Ken Holmes
3rd: Pretty Woman: Richard Hudson

Race 7 - IRC
1st: Showtime: Mark Griffith
2nd: Pretty Woman: Richard Hudson
3rd: Dreki Sunnan: Ken Holmes

Race 7 - ORCi
1st: Showtime: Mark Griffith
2nd: Pretty Woman: Richard Hudson
3rd: Dreki Sunnan: Ken Holmes

Race 7 Results Here
Series Scores to Come