Skip to main content

2025 NZL Worlds Dates announced.

OFFICIAL - The 2025 A-Cat Worlds will be held at Manly Sailing Club, North Island, New Zealand. Dates - 8th-16th November 2025.

We can now look forward enormously to this event, at the club where no lesser sailor than Russel Coutts is Commodore, so we hope as many as possible can come over join in the party in Aeoteroa, the 'Land Of The Long White Cloud'!

AUS Nationals crown Adam Beattie and Scott Anderson their 2024 Champions

The final day of a regatta can be a strange one. Sometimes, it all comes down to the last race as in the Toulon Worlds, and sometimes the last downwind leg of that race too, as we saw in Houston. On other occasions, the frontrunner is already decided and can afford to not even race as the discard would take care of the points gained for a DNR. Today was such an event. Both Scotty Anderson and Adam Beattie had the championship sewn up probably 2 races ago. So, some choose not to race and give someone else their chance of a bullet.

Australian National Championships clinched, with a race to go.

The penultimate day at the AUS A-Cat Nationals as another fun day on the lake. Although the predicted wind didn’t seem to come up to the promise of 2 kts more that yesterday, it was still an acceptable 8-11 knots. A nice clear blue sky also helped too. 2 races were scheduled for today, leaving a single race on Friday morning. As a result, because the standings overnight were the way they were, it was a fair chance that at least one fleet would see their Champion emerge unless something untoward happened.

AUS Nats, day 3, the wind and sun finally came to the party,

Day three, out on the lake, was when the place finally delivered what the locals were used to. The Australian A-Cat Nationals saw Easterly breezes, at about 13-14 knots and, coupled with a blue sky arriving on que, it was Aussie Sparkling Wine sailing at last. Coming into the day, the Race Officer had already achieved a championship, with 6 races completed. He was by now, nicely on track to complete a full series of 12 races, where the much desired second discards would arrive.

AUS Nationals, day 2.

The second day out on Lake Macquarie, and the AUS 2024 A-Class Cat Nationals saw the wind 180 deg to yesterday. The scheduled start time of 11.00 was, for some reason not fully communicated to me, was pushed back to 13.00. No matter, the fleet just sat about and talked more, and it allowed this correspondent to get his reports done earlier, so every cloud, as they say. However, looking back, it did mean that the fleet actually missed out on the hour of the best breeze of the day.

Snakes and ladders in day 1 of the AUS Nationals

At day one of the Australian A-Cat National Championships, on the waters of South Lake Macquarie Amateur Sailing Club, NSW, the cream of the Australian fleet assembled. 46 boats, over half of the National Fleet, were joined by two US guests. The draw for the Americans, Mike Christiansen, US No.3, and Ravi Parent, 2022 World A-Cat and F-18 Champion, was a chance to compete in the most competitive National fleet in the World. The fleet currently boasts a host of multiple World Champions, Olympic medallists and even an America’s Cup skipper.

WGM Ballot results

Class Rule C.5.s change about trapeze harness : Accepted

The proposal to alter the Class Rules to allow any type of trapeze harness has been massively accepted. Following the members ballot conducted as a result of the proposal by the Australian National Association, voted during the WGM 2023, along with some optional questions we asked during this consultation. The results are published below. This will now go off to World Sailing to be validated and incorporated into the Class Rules.

AUS Nationals ready to go.

This week the Australian A-Cat fleet assembles for it’s National Championships. This year it is at the South Lake Macquarie Amateur Sailing Club, a return after 9 years. The lake lies just to the South of Newcastle, NSW, about 90 mins away from Sydney, on the Australian Southeast coast. The vast lake, some 120 Km2 in area, is the largest saltwater lake in the Southern Hemisphere. It is a Ria, which I’m sure you vividly remember from those school geography lessons, is a drowned non glacial river valley with an opening to the sea.

2023 Review of the A-Cat Year.

For many of us, 2023 was a somewhat frustrating year. A combination of global warming changing weather patterns, with cost of living and fuel increases, saw a few European events cancelled or having lower than expected turnouts. The curse of the internet, whereby some sailors tend now to only make the call to attend an event less than a week before, after deciding if it’s ‘their weather’ is now also a big factor, and this knock-on effect for clubs mean that fewer of them are prepared to take a punt to put in the effort and mobilise their volunteers into organising an event.