Yachting: Around Alone race stopover shortened

A Tauranga stopover for the Around Alone single-handed yacht race has been condensed into three weeks and may possibly leave skippers of smaller boats out of the recreational loop.

Race owner Clipper Ventures has heeded the concerns of competitors -- including Hexagon skipper New Zealander Graham Dalton -- and decided to start the Cape Town to Tauranga leg of the race a week later than planned.

The change allows more breathing room for the smaller open-50 yachts between reaching South Africa and departing on the third leg to New Zealand.

But instead of the leading yachts adding a touch of glamour to Tauranga's peak Christmas-New Year holiday period by arriving about December 28, they now are not expected to reach port until January 4.

This would not have posed many problems except Clipper Ventures has retained the January 26 departure date from Tauranga.

Tauranga Around Alone project manager Mike Pattison says the later arrival time will not add to the pressures created by the usual Christmas-New Year crush.

Compressing the stopover to three weeks was a double-edged sword. A four-week stopover meant organisers were able to keep the level of activity low for the first 10 days until nearly all boats had reached port.

Major events were being organised to coincide with the arrival of most of the fleet but squeezing everything into three weeks had robbed organisers of lead-in time, Mr Pattison said. They now had to decide when they should hold the mayoral reception and the summer ball.

He said competitors would not thank them for holding the ball a couple of days out from setting sail and organisers wanted as many skippers as possible to attend the mayoral reception.

- BAY OF PLENTY TIMES