Back in 1770 the famous navigator Captain James Cook RN sailed the bark Endeavour through the spectacular Whitsunday Islands, probably logging no more than 3 to 4 knots on his famous voyage of discovery up the east coast of Australia. 

Today, the world's most modern sailing vessel, the New Zealand super maxi Alfa Romeo hit speeds of 17 knots as she sailed to victory in race three of the Hamilton Island Hahn Premium Race Week in the Whitsundays, named by Cook so long ago, and now one of Australia's most popular yacht cruising and racing waterways. It was the first round-the-buoys race for Alfa Romeo, the 30-metre Reichel/Pugh sloop launched only three weeks ago - and she reveled in the 13-14 knot south-easterly tradewinds on a course near Pentacost Island, a spectacular rocky outcrop also named by Cook.

Not only did Alfa Romeo scorch away from the grand prix IRC fleet over the 11.5 nautical mile windward/leeward course but also won on corrected time, her second handicap win of Race Week, beating two other Reichel/Pugh canting keel boats, Bob Oatley's Wild Oats and Steven David's Wild Joe. They had followed her distantly around the course in what was clearly a big boat race.

In the back-to-back race four, sailed over a slight shorter windward/leeward course, the super maxi had to be content with a second on corrected time, the first place being reversed in favour of Wild Oats, with Wild Joe again third. Stephen Ainsworth's newly-launched Loki, a Reichel/Pugh 60 with a conventional keel placed fourth in both races. The crew of Wild Oats, with Mark Richards on the helm, sailed an exceptionally good race, showing their technical experience of handling boats with canting keels for the past two to three years. Their use of the canting keel in a dipping and tacking maneouvre coming in at the pin end of the start line in race three was an eye-opener.

The day was not without its glitches for Alfa Romeo in what tactician Michael Coxon emphasizes is a "commissioning week" for the highly complex new boat, which features a canting keel, dual rudders and hydraulic winches. An electrical problem saw Alfa Romeo sail all day without instruments. "We had to eyeball the shifts and the lay lines - it was like sailing an Etchells," said Coxon, a champion Etchells sailor. He and co-tactician, Adrian Stead, did this extremely well, achieving a perfect long layline tack to the windward mark for the first time round in race three.
 

With owner/skipper Neville Crichton at the helm, Alfa Romeo made an excellent start mid-line in the first race of the day, quickly powering into the lead right on the gun, but in the second race tactician Michael Coxon advised Crichton to hold back slightly because there was not a sufficient gap on the line for the big boat and too many small boats to leeward. "We must be sufficiently high above the smaller boats to avoid sucking out their wind as we come over them and having them stand upright, possibly causing a rig contact. It was a safety decision for them and us," he explained.

The second glitch came only 200 metres from the finish of the second race. As the helmsman began a spinnaker gybe to lay the finish line, the boat's low-revving engine stalled, as a result losing all power for the hydraulic system operating the canting keel and mainsheet traveller winch. "We had to gybe back until we could restart the motor," Coxon said.

Alfa Romeo sailed both races in 13-14 knots of wind, with a No 1 heavy headsail and Code 2 running spinnaker. "Upwind we were getting 11.5 to 12.25 knots, downwind 15-15 knots average and up to 17 knots," Coxon said. "Despite the glitches today we are very happy with the boat - two first places and a second in four races on IRC corrected time shows we are getting the right numbers in our first week of racing," Coxon added.

After four races of the nine race series, the consistent Loki leads overall with 14 points from a consistent score of 2-4-4-4. Wild Joe, the champion 60-footer of the winning Australian team at the 2003 Admiral's Cup when owned by Bob Oatley, is second on 15 boats from placings of 3-6-3-3 while Oatley's new Wild Oats, a 66-footer, is third with 18 points from a score of 4-11-2-1. Alfa Romeo, with a score of 1-24-1-2 is fifth on 28 points, with Ray Roberts' DK46, Hollywood Boulevard  in fourth place on 27 points, her placings to date being 8-7-7-5. Two more short windward/leeward races are scheduled for Wednesday (24 August), followed by the Whitehaven Beach Race on Thursday and two more medium distance races on Friday and Saturday.

Hamilton Island Hahn Premium Race Week, now in its 22nd year, has not only attracted a record total fleet of 207 boats, but the 29-boat IRC Class must rank as among the best regatta fleets in the world. Sixteen of the boats have been launched within the past three years, nine of them within the last 12 months and six have state-of-the-art canting keels. The average age of the fleet does go up, however, because of the age of two classic wooden boats - Koomooloo, which won the Sydney Hobart Race in 1968, and the remarkable Fife-designed Eun-na-mara launched in 1907!  Eun-na-mara today notched up a 10th and an equal 8th place on corrected time and is 9th in overall standings, Koomooloo a 14th and an 11th to be 11th in standings.