There is a 22 year old American exchange student in Cape Town who has extensive sailing experience and has also spent 6 months sailing on Regent Express last year, who is available and keen to crew for any Pacer 27 team for the whole of the nationals. He weighs 70 kgs/ 6ft tall and has a quiet, pleasant disposition. Connor Leech may be contacted on +27714261871

Please get your entries in for the Nationals and Mykonos Offshore. The late entry penalty is heavy!

Trygve Roberts on Regent Express went out in a strong south easter during Nov 2011 and experienced a catapult broach doing 20 knots. The result was almost catastrophic as the skipper went overboard and got separated from his boat. They had a video camera running which captured all the drama. Read his story and watch the video here: http://www.pacer27.co.za/news.html

After a vote by boat owners, it has been unanimously decided to run the 2012 Pacer 27 Nationals in conjunction with the Mykonos Offshore in the same format as the last two years. Two days of round the cans racing will be followed by the distance race to Club Mykonos and a Bay Race in Saldanha Bay on the final day. Start your travel arrangements early and get those trailer wheeel bearings replaced or serviced.

Simply fabulous, competitive inshore racing in perfect conditions. Two local Pacers entered, with Regent Express sailing around from RCYC and resident boat Felix the Cat, making up the two solitary entries in the Club 1 fleet representing the Pacer 27 Sport.

Of the 10 entries in the Club 1 fleet, the Pacers really nailed some excellent results, competing against mainly Farr 38’s and Farr 40’s to take the two top spots in the fleet.

Felix the Cat managed to beat Regent Express, which had been leading, on the final day with two bullets. These two boats had a ball, racing in very close proximity to one another in most of the races. It must have impressed any observer as to the boat’s inherent one design aspect.

For those that didn’t, couldn’t or wouldn’t enter, please do so next year. This one is worth it!

For a full report on the event with photos and videos, go here: www.pacer27.co.za

Unruly takes Gold
Another hugely successful 2011 Pacer 27 nationals saw crews and skippers heading for home very satisfied with the format and quality of racing. Most agreed it was competitive in the extreme with the slightest mistake being punished by a lost place or two. There was drama aplenty, some controversy and a few crew were washed overboard in the frenetic start of the distance race, but the final winner “Unruly” did what was necessary with a consistent performance and placings no lower than 3rd to take the gold medals. Owner Iain Gibson from DAC on the Vaal Dam, had selected his crew cleverly with two Cape Town sailors on board in the form of Richard Tanner on the helm and Davey James trimming. Unruly, all agreed, was the worthy winner.

Read the rest of this story here: http://www.pacer27.co.za/archive/23_Feb_11.html

Three Pacer 27s competed in this great annual event on the pristine waters of False Bay – namely the two resident boats Felix the Cat and Unmatched owned by Ant and Graham Wentworth respectively and Trygve Roberts sailed Regent express around from RCYC. Guy Nottingham could unfortunately not make it and the promised entry of two Melges 24 sent any hopes of making a seperate sports boat class hit the deck with a thud.

Racing area for Intasure Spring Regatta

Felix the Cat was the best placed of the three with a solid performance but Regent Express was perpetually on the attack making for a highly competitive event between the two boats. Unmatched was right up there as well with some excellent starts and perhaps a very light crew might have held them back a bit. Some blistering speeds were attained with the Pacers hitting over 17 knots on some of the downwind legs.

There is a comprehensive write up with pics here www.pacer27.co.za for anyone interested in the full story.

News is in from Gautengaleng that three Pacers entered the DAC Keel Boat Week. Those were Sebago (Guy Nottingham) and Ian Gibsons’ Unruly’ with Iain steering a full regatta for the first time. Derick Robinson brought Skwert 2 up from Loskop to make up the third boat. Sebago dominated the results with the Robinsons quickly getting into Pacer mode towards the end of the event.

All this is good news for the class and great to see six boats actively sailing at a competitive level. Word from Port Elizabeth is that Russell Morgan has sorted out the issues on Wild Thing after that humungus storm last year and he is back on the water again.

Start making your plans now already for the 2011 Nationals which will be the same format as this year and it will be run in conjunction with the Mykonos Offshore as in the past. An extra day of cans racing will be added in front of the event. It looks like we have a guaranteed entry of 7 Pacers and the factory have indicated their willingness to bolster the numbers with rented boats.

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In it’s second year, the amalgamation of the old Table Bay Sailing Week and the Admirals Regatta, has gained some impressive sponsorship, adding attractive cash prizes for competitors as well as TV coverage. This year the format was changed to span two weekends of which the first was a long weekend. This might be the reason for lower entries this year and perhaps the event should revert back to being sailed over a single weekend.

With some gleaming new Mercedes-Benz cars on display on the quayside outside RCYC the competitors set to preparing their boats for the first race on Saturday 20th March, in perfectly windless conditions, resulting in a one hour postponement. Closer to lunchtime, a light westerly set in of around 7 knots, allowing race officer, Doug Alison, to set a good length course.

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Report by Trygve Roberts
Seriously close one design racing is what this event was all about. Despite the fairly small entry of six boats, those that were on the water enjoyed outstanding close quarters racing with many of the races seeing four Pacers finishing within 30 seconds of each other.

Felix the cat out in front in Race 1

Ant Wentworth’s ‘Felix the Cat’ ended up as the overall winners, notwithstanding the top four boats all finishing on 10 points each for a four way tie.
Second placed ‘Regent Express‘ ended with an identical scoreline to ‘Felix the cat’ where the tie was broken on the better position in the final race – the very race where ‘Regent Express‘ skippered by Trygve Roberts had a halyard break and sent them plummeting from a possible 1st place right down to last in the final race. They jury rigged a second halyard and fought back to finish 4th in the final race, but it was one point too little for the overall win.
Finishing 3rd overall was Andrea Giovaninni  on ‘Pacer 3‘ fresh from a similar podium finish in the Lipton Cup. He said after the event he could not believe how competitive the Pacer fleet was and had underestimated the quality of the racing.
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