Women sailing boats that blokes lend them. Keelers, that is. Yachts thirty-foot plus.
The concept is to take complete beginners from all walks of life out sailing on Tauranga Harbour. During the season, each WoW night attracts over one hundred women to sessions organised by Tauranga Yacht and Power Boat Club (TYPBC).
I’m sitting on the steps of the slipway at Sulphur Point chatting to five women. Rascal Tom, a Young 88 design, is up on a cradle, white paintwork polished and gleaming. The keel has been scraped down for a coat of antifouling. Gun Caundle has been putting bog on spots that need it. The all-women crew, who’ve helped prepare the yacht for the coming racing season, are relaxing with a beer.
Gun joins us. “I’ve never had a working bee like this,” he says. “With men, it just doesn’t happen.”
“It’s good to learn other aspects of owning a boat,” a woman comments. “We know we need to help with the upkeep.”
I ask Gun, “How did you start lending your boat for racing?”
“It’s what you do. If someone needs a boat and you’ve got confidence in them, why not? It’s what I grew up with – you lend your boat.”
He’d been racing his boat with a male crew, and when his daughter Robyn came back to Tauranga in 2018, she began to crew for him, and then with WoW.
Every second Thursday during summer WoW women register, pay a fee and are assigned a boat for that race. Fifteen to twenty boats are available for sailing, but only three or four for racing. The remainder go in a training division. Race courses are organised by the club; boats matched with a WoW crew.
“I saw WoW advertised on Facebook,” says Lyndsay Hayward. “I grew up sailing, knew I wanted to race, so I joined that division.”
“I met Lyndsay for the 2018 WoW season,” adds Robyn. “Now we’re part of the set crew for the season on Dad’s boat.”
Petite Anita is a doctor by day. “To have a different skipper each week is a hard but good way to learn. Skippers want to teach people about their yachts and sailing. I moved here from the South Island in 2016 and always wanted to sail, so I joined WoW. I crewed with Elly’s Dad on his boat, then got talked into crewing on Rascal Tom.”
“I grew up sailing from age six,” says Elly, “dinghy sailing with the family. I graduated from sailing school and knew I wanted to sail keel boats. Even though I wasn’t eighteen, the minimum age for joining WoW, I managed to wangle my way in, going between boats. Dad crewed with Gun for a long time. I jumped at it when Robyn offered me a spot. It makes such a difference as a team, learning to work together, learning your role, making friends, joining in the discussion instead of only one of us making the decision.”
“The more you sail, the more you want to,” Robyn says, “and the more you ask. I asked Gun if we could put together an all-women’s crew. He agreed without hesitation. We’re competent with manoeuvring the boat safely. Gun taught us how to handle it.”
The TYPBC WoW Series runs a Mark Foy start. Boats set off at different times according to length, but finish together. Robin explains, “Essentially we race ourselves around the course, go the best we can and learn by doing.”
Last summer for a greater challenge, supported by Gun, they entered the Wednesday Night Series. Gun had to sack himself and his male crew, whoagreed it was for a good cause. It’s a first, the only boat helmed by a female in the male-dominated event, fitting for the centenary year of the TYPBC.
With the Mount Maunganui Yacht Club (MMYC), Robyn and Lyndsay thoroughly enjoyed the 2020 2-Handed Winter Series, came second in their division and won Best and Fairest Trophy. In summer the MMYC hosts a Blue Water series; the most exciting event being the Legends Regatta to Great Mercury Island over Labour Weekend.
“In 2019 we started a day late as a gale was blowing. After ten boisterous hours of sailing we made it to Coralie Bay on dusk.” Robyn is grinning. “Gun leaped on board before we’d even parked the boat, he was so pleased to see us. We heard ‘Well done, girls’ a lot as the bubbly popped.”
Kate, a science teacher at Tauranga Girls College, was asked by student Elly to be their ‘sailing tutor’ for a school course. She went on a Learn to Sail course herself to ‘learn the language’, and had a year crewing on different boats.
She says, “I was in the right place at the right time when the Rascal Tom crew was selected.”
These women love sailing and the social side, but always hold a debrief on the race before a celebratory drink. They enjoy the range of people they meet, and the freedom of the ocean.”
“You need to cruise more,” Gun tells them. “Take the boat out for a weekend. It’s a different sailing experience to racing.”
