2025 Australian 13ft and 16ft Skiff Championships Overall
by Mark Rothfield 11 Jan 2025 13:16 GMT
4-11 January 2025
Manly's IMEI, skippered by Joel Beashel and with old hands Rob Napper and Trent Barnabas aboard, has claimed victory in the 2025 Hervey Bay Boat Club 16ft Skiff Australian Championships after the final race was abandoned today due a dying breeze.
At just 16 years of age, Beashel is believed to be the youngest ever winner in the proud history of the coveted national title, adding to a Belmont 16s Club Championship he took home last season. It also meant a great deal to Napper and Barnabas, who've both claimed multiple titles but endured some close misses in recent years.
Ironically, it rewrote the script from the 2022 championships at Belmont when IMEI came second to Nathan Wilmot after the final race was also abandoned. While not necessarily the way Beashel wanted to seal the deal, he was honoured to win in only his second full year steering a 16.
"We didn't have the greatest start to the week but we had a nice reset on the layday and focused on sailing what we know," Beashel said. "We had some good results after that, which put us back into the fight.
"It's a big honour to potentially be the youngest, but the biggest contributing factor is these two guys taking me on. We keep tweaking things to get more speed out of the boat, which makes it easier on the race course."
Consistency won the day as IMEI achieved a top-four result in five of the eight races sailed, carding an 11th as their worst score in an event with wide-ranging conditions. Their game plan today, if racing had proceeded, was to stick with runner-up Imagine Signage, the final differential being 8pts.
Modern Concept Constructions dominated the first four races but couldn't maintain the pace as the week progressed, still doing well to finish on 55pts in 3rd place overall.
"Look, it has been a bittersweet week - had a cracking start but just couldn't keep it consistent like these guys could," skipper Kurt Hansen said. "Kudos to IMEI for nailing the second half of the regatta, and also to Nathan.
"We can't be too sad with 3rd place. We had four good races and four bad ones, and the bad races come down to one simple decision on the course that leaves you out the back door in this kind of fleet. Many lessons learnt out there."
Heidi Bates and Orlando Sadlick teamed to win the 13ft Skiff national title by a comfortable 21 points, their only blemish being an OCS (startline infringement) in Race 2 on Monday. They responded with five wins and a 2nd to eclipse The Kitchen Maker and Botany Scaffold 13.
"It's really exciting as we've never won a national title before," Bates said. Sadlick added: "I've had two cracks at the title before so to finally win it, third-time lucky, is great. We're really good friends and able to problem-solve together while also focusing on our own roles."
Host club Maryborough Sailing Club and the Queensland 16ft Skiff Association did a brilliant job all week, particularly getting the 75 entries off the beach. Key regatta sponsors were The Boat Club Hervey Bay, Fraser Coast Regional Council and Fraser Island Boat Charters. More details at the event website.
Full results available here.