The Bird Island Race kicks off this weekend as the halfway point of the Audi Centre Sydney Blue Water Pointscore, and the fleet has swelled rather than thinned out. Forty-five boats will cross the startline at 1000 hours on Saturday, well up on the 25 that lined up for the Tollgate Islands Race back in October.
It is the shortest race of the series, just 83 nautical miles north to Bird Island off Norah Head and back into Sydney Harbour. With a short course and a packed line, the start is likely to be tight and chaotic.
Jules Hall's double-handed J/99 Disko Trooper tops the IRC standings with eight points, built from a second, a first and a fifth. Sean Langman's GP42 Back 2 Black sits three points adrift on 11, having won the season opener before finishing third at Tollgate.
Then the gap widens. Sebastian Bohm's TP52 Smuggler climbed to third on 20 points after winning the Tollgate Overall, with Michael Rowe and Ben Martin's Cookson 12 Kanreki just one point further back on 21. Edward Cox's Ker 40 Minerva and the Sydney 36 Supernova, campaigned by Alex Seja and Felicity Nelson, are locked together on 22 points apiece.
Size-wise, nothing in the fleet comes close to Anthony Bell's 100-footer Tribeca LOYAL. Master Lock Comanche covered the course in 5 hours, 43 minutes and 52 seconds last year, a time the big boats will be chasing again.
Anthony and David Johnston's URM Group returns as the defending IRC winner from last year's race. They won't have it easy, with Geoffrey Hill's Santa Cruz 72 Antipodes and Karl Kwok's Fast 40 Beau Ideal, both out of Hong Kong, also on the entry list.
Double Handed sailors will be watching three J/99s in particular: Disko Trooper, Jupiter and Verite. Disko Trooper took out Double Handed IRC last time, while Paul Beath's Verite claimed the PHS honours.
If the weather plays along, the leaders should be back on the dock by late afternoon. The tail of the fleet is another story entirely. Mark Ayto's S&S 34 Western Morning took more than 20 hours to finish last year's edition, and she's lining up again regardless.
The race also doubles as a round of the Coastal Pointscore. The fleet can be followed live on the race tracker from 1000 hours Saturday.
