Chewbacca may be an odd name for a flighty International Contender Class sailing dinghy but she has been literally on fire with her skipper Matt Mulder ‘smoking’ over the course to win all three heats of the 2010 Australian championship.
He has a accrued numerous miles of bump and bash sailing over his home club course and this experience has reflected with a stand out performance against a number of the World’s best who have found that the Queensland champion continues to firm as the favourite for the World championship next week.
Mulder encouraged by his proud father Jan to take up Contender racing at a young age has progressively matured developing the required fitness and aquatic acrobatic skills to sail the physically demanding dinghy to her ultimate speed.
His powerful physique and seemingly endless energy was pressed to the limit in the rig tormenting 25-28 knot southerly on Monday.
However he still managed to ward off a number of impressive challengers including the experienced Italian Andrea Bonezzi to score a close and impressive win.
The class of the Queensland champion was on show again today adding further bonus points to winning possibly his third Australian title while also improving his prospects of winning his first World title.
Mulder is happy with his boat speed but like all sailors who have raced this Bob Miller (Ben Lexcen) designed dinghy and experienced the cruel time penalties that come with the slightest error has predictably remained conservative on the possible outcome.
After winning the opening heat he said “I’m happy but there is still a long way to go”.
But at least he holds the major points and continued with a similar ‘stand alone’ performance in moderating winds to build a perfect 1-1-1 score after securing a 47 second victory in this afternoons third heat over Andrea Bonezzi who remains in a progressive nip-n-tuck dog fight with England’s Simon Mussell and Victorian Jono Neate as the most likely to challenge Matt Mulder when the sails are tensioned for the major medals in the final two heats tomorrow.
By Ian Grant.