Peter Morrison came out of retirement to steer Rosemount to victory in the Life Members Trophy race on Sydney Harbour yesterday during the Australian 18 Footers League championship.

Morrison replaced the regular skipper Colin Selwood and with crewmen Kevin Jarvis and Mike Mc Kensey led all the way to score a 13 seconds victory over the James Francis skippered Panasonic with Omega Smeg (Daniel Phillips) a further 3 seconds back in third place.

From a handicap start Rosemount and Panasonic led the fleet around the first lap of the course in a 10-12knot north-east wind. Hot on their tails were CWL (Clynton Wade Lehman), Appliances Online (John Winning Jr) and Omega Smeg.

Rosemount continued to lead narrowly (10 seconds) from Panasonic at the second windward mark while Maytag (Tony Hannan) had improved her position to third. The backmarkers were struggling in the conditions and never looked likely to threaten the leading group.

Rosemount extended her lead over Panasonic to 45 seconds at the end of the second lap while Omega Smeg was now a clear third placing – 1min 10secs behind the leader.

The race was set up for a tight finish over the final triangle lap of the course and the spectator fleet were not disappointed as the leading trio staged a great finish – particularly over the final downwind leg of the course.

Results

1 Rosemount 1:31:07 1 handicap place 37 Season Pointscore
2 Panasonic 1:31:20 2 handicap place 14 Season Pointscore
3 Omega Smeg 1:31:23 3 handicap place 32 Season Pointscor
4 Maytag 4 handicap place 31 Season Pointscore
5 CWL 5 handicap place 36 Season Pointscore
6 Appliances Online 6 handicap place 38 Season Pointscore