Three races decided everything, and it was family on both sides of the dial-up.
The 2025 Harken International Youth Match Racing Championship reached its conclusion on Pittwater with a final that rarely let either sailor breathe. Zach Fong and his crew, Alissa Marshall, Nick Drummond, Wilbur Stanley, and Hayden Smith, met his younger brother Ethan Fong, crewed by Hugo McMullen, Madison Rist, Harry McMullen, and Lucas Day, across three races that swung hard and settled late. When it was over, Zach had turned every one of them around. Three starts to Ethan, three finishes to Zach. A new Harken champion.
What made the result striking was how little Zach had announced himself before the knockout stages. He entered the championship without a ranking and opened the first round robin with a mid-fleet record that put him well behind the leading group. His sailing through the early days lacked the consistency that separated the top performers from the pack. A stronger 7–3 run on day three steadied his campaign and moved him into the knockout rounds with something closer to genuine momentum, but few would have picked him to win it from there.
The semifinal changed that read quickly. Zach's opponent was Samuel Scott, the standout of the week and, by the numbers, the most complete sailor at the event. Scott had posted an 8–1 record in the first round robin and followed it with 6–3 in the second, navigating a shifting Pittwater breeze with calm, clean sailing that kept him clear of trouble throughout. He arrived at the semifinal as the clear favourite. Zach dismantled that advantage within minutes. He found the shifts earlier, committed harder at each gate, and won both races to take the tie 2–0. There was no hesitation in the performance, just a sailor who had found his rhythm at precisely the right moment.
Ethan's path to the final ran through Robbie Wooldridge in a tighter semifinal that went to a deciding third race, eventually settling 2–1 in Ethan's favour. His method had been consistent all week. He attacked the start line, defended the first beat aggressively, and used the right-hand pressure lanes whenever the breeze allowed. In the final those habits showed up immediately. Ethan cleared the line cleanly in all three races and held Zach out of phase through the opening minutes of each one. For a spell in every race, it looked as though the younger brother might hold on.
Pittwater had other ideas. The final day brought a shifting southerly influence across the course, with soft patches sitting through the middle of the race area and gusts building hard along the edges. The race committee reset the course several times as the conditions moved. The breeze punished sailors who waited for confirmation of a shift and rewarded those willing to commit before the picture was fully clear. Zach thrived there. Where Ethan won the starts and controlled the early beats, Zach found his advantage every time the fleet turned downwind.
Downwind accuracy became the thread running through all three races. In the opening match Ethan produced a slow spinnaker set, and Zach was immediately into the gap, rolling him on the run and taking a lead he did not surrender. The second race followed a similar shape. Zach timed a gybe perfectly and cut across a pressure line that carried him clear just when Ethan looked set to hold on. By the third race the pattern was settled. Ethan punched out ahead on the beat, Zach pulled back the deficit on the run with tighter drops, cleaner sail handling, and the confidence to split away when a new angle presented itself.
Scott, despite the semifinal loss, finished the week with the strongest overall numbers at the event. His round robin sailing had been smooth and controlled, and the margin that separated him from Zach in their tie came down to two missed opportunities and a single pressure call that went the wrong way. He recovered without fuss and won the Petit Final 2–0 over Wooldridge to secure third place. Wooldridge had shown real speed through the early stages of the event but struck difficulty on finals day. An over-early start and an early penalty each proved costly, a reminder that the margins tighten considerably when match racing strips back to pure head-to-head competition. All four semifinalists flew the RNZYS flag, pointing clearly to the squad's depth and the quality of preparation they had carried through a long youth match racing season.
Australian crews were competitive through the round robins and applied genuine pressure to the leading group at times, but none managed to break into the top four. The event finished as a New Zealand story, and the centrepiece of it was two brothers pushing each other through three hard races on a course that asked difficult questions throughout.
Zach's championship came from decisive thinking on an unstable course. Ethan made him work for every metre with clean starts and aggressive first beats. Between them they produced a final that reflected youth match racing at its best.
Knockout stages
Final: Zach Fong (ZF) def. Ethan Fong (EF) 3–0 Petit Final: Samuel Scott (SS) def. Robbie Wooldridge (RW) 2–0 Semi final 1: Zach Fong (ZF) def. Samuel Scott (SS) 2–0 Semi final 2: Ethan Fong (EF) def. Robbie Wooldridge (RW) 2–1
Round Robins
| DK | EF | JH | BC | SS | ML | RW | LT | HM | ZF | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DK | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 1-1 | |
| EF | 1-1 | 2-0 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 0-2 | 2-0 | 1-1 | |
| JH | 1-1 | 0-2 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 1-1 | |
| BC | 1-1 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 0-2 | |
| SS | 1-1 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 2-0 | 2-0 | |
| ML | 0-2 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | |
| RW | 2-0 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 2-0 | |
| LT | 0-2 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | |
| HM | 1-1 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 0-2 | 0-2 | |
| ZF | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 2-0 | 0-2 | 2-0 | 2-0 |
