Get your entry in for the 2025 Australian Etchells Championship
by Jeanette Severs 24 Oct 18:12 NZDT
1-5 November 2024
Entries to the International Etchells 2025 Australian Championship close at the end of Friday, October 25 © Jeanette Severs
The reigning World and Australian champions in the International Etchells class will be sailing at Metung in November, in the 2025 Australian Championship regatta.
There are only two days remaining to enter the 2025 Australian Championship regatta, which will be sailed on Lake King, Metung, in Victoria, November 1-5.
Metung Yacht Club Commodore Peter Kanat is looking forward to welcoming a world-class line-up of sailors to Metung.
An invitational race will be hosted by Metung Yacht Club on Friday, November 1, with the 2025 Australian Championship regatta getting under way on Saturday, November 2.
Race officers are Ross Wilson and Kevin Wilson. The brothers have experience with Metung's conditions - they were ROs in 2022, the last time Metung hosted the Australian championship.
In 2022, the championship was won by Tango, helmed by Chris Hampton, crewed by Sam Haines and Cam Miles.
Winning the championship in 2022, Hampton said of Metung's Lake King, "this is a great venue, it's our favourite sailing destination anywhere in the world."
Current World and Australian champion, Graeme Taylor, will bring Magpie to Metung for this year's 2025 Australian championship regatta, and he will be joined by longtime crewmate James Mayo.
Their third crew for this regatta is Ben Lamb, who sailed with John Bertrand in 2018 when they took out Grand Master status in the World Championship.
Some of the entry list is a repeat of the competitors who contested the recent 2024 NSW Championship. The 2024 runner up last week and 2023 NSW champion, Racer CC helmed by Mark Thornburrow, was entered a few days ago.
Magpie finished one place behind Hong Kong registered Racer CC this year and in 2023.
Flying High, helmed by Jeanne-Claude Strong, third in the 2023 NSW Championship behind Racer CC and Magpie, is also a recent entrant for the Metung regatta.
Flying High finished sixth in the recently contested 2024 NSW championship.
Among the early entrants in the 2025 Australian championship were Tiger (Nigel Abbott), Great White Hunter (David Dunn), African Queen (Jan Muysken), Karabos (Martin Naef) and Avalon (Michael Bellingham).
One of the earliest yachts registered for the Metung regatta is 2107 Racing, helmed by David Taylor and crewed by Mark Hellyer and Mat Butterworth. They have been joined by stablemates from Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club, Flirtation (Matt Crawford), Game Plan (Ron Jacobs) and Karabos (Naef).
These competitors will be met by a mix of mature and youth sailors on board the Metung Etchells fleet.
Most of the Metung Etchells fleet has entered the 2025 Australian championship, with sailors aged 13 to mid-30s across several yachts. Many of these young sailors have benefited from the expertise among the more mature fleet, who include ocean and bay sailors with some renown themselves.
Sam King is on board Toby Richardson's yacht, Jindivik. Richardson and King sail together regularly, and are bringing on board 2017 Victorian Junior Sailor of the Year, Michael Parks, for this regatta.
Local youth sailors include Jack Abbott and James McLennan. Abbott was on the helm and McLennan was one of the crew of Ireland Girl, to win the Victorian championship earlier this year on Lake King.
Abbott and McLennan return in Martin Hill's Lisa Rose, sailing with Tom Trotman and Xavier Winston-Smith, as part of a dedicated campaign for the 2025 World championship regatta.
HillPDA Sailing Team is supporting a youth team with the aim of increasing participation at the upcoming World Championship and within the class.
Martin Hill has also founded the Club Corinthian - For the Love of Sailing program, introduced by the Australian Etchells Fleet this season, specifically out of the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, to celebrate amateur and youth sailors participating in competitive fleet racing.
Club Corinthian is an initiative to specifically highlight and support the efforts of amateur and youth sailors on the world stage.
Hill's overall goal is to promote youth sailing and provide a pathway to encourage more Corinthians into club racing.
"I look back to the glory days of the Admiral's Cup, Kenwood Cup, and Southern Cross (1960s to mid-1990s) with all those talented Corinthian sailors," Hill said.
"Those sailors, many as youth, took on winning world championships in Etchells, Solings, J24s, and more. That style of Corinthian sailor, both at an international and at club levels, has taken a back step in the last few decades."
Corinthian sailors, which includes youth, are very much enthusiasts, and their attendance at all regattas, big and small, is driven by the love of the sport.
"During Cowes Week in 2018, I saw the UK Etchells fleet promoting a youth squad including a pathway for disadvantaged youth to compete," Hill said.
"At the Etchells Worlds Championship in Corpus Christie in 2019, those UK youth teams competed against the USA youth teams. It was a race within a race.
"They had a ball, and I was proud of their friendly spirit curbed with competitiveness. They did it for the love of sailing."
Throughout the 2024-2025 season, the Club Corinthian - For the Love of Sailing program offers coaching opportunities both on and off the water, will provide team resources, and award additional prizes.
"I gave the challenge to Jack Abbott to form a competitive youth team for the Melbourne Worlds in 2025 and he took it up with zeal," Hill said.
Jack Abbott grew up sailing the Gippsland Lakes, under the tutelage of his father, Nigel, a world champion himself.
Abbott is a youth sailor who has been working towards the Etchells World Championships 2025 thanks to the support of Martin Hill, who was impressed with his competitiveness and character.
"We have four sailors in the team but there are many who contribute to the HillPDA Sailing Team," Abbott said.
"Martin Hill is heavily supporting our campaign and has given us the opportunity to further our Etchells journey. We are being guided by legends in the class.
"We're doing every event this season to support local fleets and further our own experience.
"Our crew has only been sailing Etchells for just under two years, there's much to learn and we are putting ourselves out there in the hope to inspire similar crews to participate in the Etchells class."
Stephen Bull, skipper of Come Monday, and Vice Commodore of Metung Yacht Club, said the racing conditions on Lake King would challenge the best sailors.
"Lake King throws up variable wind conditions and sea states," Bull said.
"The winds fluctuate a lot, both in direction and pressure, and the sea can be quite flat or quite choppy, depending on wind direction and strength.
"Good sailors always adapt to varying conditions."
Entries to the 2025 Australian Championship are open until the end of Friday, October 25. Entries should be completed online through metungyachtclub.com.au