Just to give you the latest on the performance of timber boats at Aussie Taipan Nationals....

At the Championships held in January this year in the Cat rigged class Ist place went to Glenn Ashby (current world A-class champion) on AUS155 and second to Noel Grellet on AUS003. Both these boats are timber boats.

AUS003 is of course the 3rd 4.9 built - around the late 80's and it is still competitive. Noel has won this event on many previous occasions and was thought to be nearly unbeatable in the Cat class... until Glenn came along... Glenn was consistenly about 3 minutes ahead of the rest of the fleet at the nats!! - a testament to his extraordinary ability and to the competitiveness of timber boats.

AUS155 is one of the "boats from our group" that Wouter mentioned in his post.

I sail a timber 4.9 as well (also one of "the group") and get the same reaction that Wouter does when he says that his boat is made of timber - disbelief. I also have had to remove the hatch covers to prove it.

Rob
Timber Taipan 4.9 AUS175.

If you are interested in a closer look at the 2003 Australian Taipan Championships Results and Reports see:

http://www.taipan.asn.au/~taipan/pages/2003Nats/2003_nats_frame_page.htm