Freefire coming up to the finish – Guy Nowell, RHKYC pic
 
With an average VMG of 13.4 knots, Sam Chan’s TP52, Freefire, arrived in Hainan at 17 03 54hrs on October 19  to claim line honours in the 2012 Hong Kong to Hainan Race and better her predecessor’s record (FfreeFire 71) by 51m 14s with an elapsed time of 28h 43m 54s.
 
Freshly arrived on the dock at Serenity Marina and still to clear CIQ, owner Sam Chan was clearly delighted, not only with the boat and the team’s performance, but also with the prevailing conditions.
 
“We had great wind and a great wind angle all the way, giving us another new record and beating our old one. It’s great to be back in Hainan and without a single breakage on the boat, which topped out at 23 knots boat speed – champagne sailing,” Chan enthused.
 
RHKYC’s Rear Commodore Sailing and Chan’s second in command, Russ Parker added, “It was a great race in lovely conditions – the boat was flying along! It’s great to be here.”
 
Freefire stands a very good chance of ‘doing the double”, that is, winning the IRC overall as well as line honours. Her nearest rivals for that particular silverware are Jonathan Mahony’s Zanzibar and Anthony Root’s Red Kite II both of whom are very much still in the game with projected corrected times just outside of the TP52’s.
 
The next boats expected on the water are Jelik V and Antipodes who have traded places on the water all the way down from Hong Kong and will finish around 1930hrs this evening.
 
SOURCE: yachte.com
 
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