MRV stifles Ambition to take Line Honours and Overall Win in the 2025 Apollo Bay Race
By Jane Austin/ORCV media
Celebrating their win! All smiles for skipper Damien King (far left/front) and Crew on MRV / Photo by Damien King
Margaret Rintoul V (MRV), skippered by Damien King from the Sandringham Yacht Club (SYC), has sailed a fast and furious race to win the 72nd Melbourne to Apollo Bay Race (M2AB).
While the lyrics of a well-known song suggest ‘history never repeats’, King has well and truly proved that good things can happen twice, carrying his exceptional performance from the 70th anniversary race into this year’s event winning on line honours and on overall AMS and PHS handicaps.
The 52 nautical mile race, run by the Ocean Racing Club of Victoria (ORCV), started in brisk conditions at 4 am on Saturday morning with 185 sailors making quick progress off the Queenscliff start line in a 15 knot westerly breeze.
The Frers 61 MRV was the first boat through Port Phillip Heads followed by ORCV Coastal Championship leaders Ginan, skippered by Cameron McKenzie and Nigel Jones from the Mornington Yacht Club, and Steve Twentyman’s Hanse 505, Shimmer.
The forecast was for cracked sheets all the way to Apollo Bay and while the majority of the fleet navigated the race well, others encountered some quiet patches and were ‘parked’ for a short time.
The battle for line honours was on from the start with MRV, Chris Dare’s Ambition from the Derwent Sailing Squadron in Tasmania, and Shimmer all in with a chance to claim first-home bragging rights.
King didn’t have it all his own way though with new fleet entrant Ambition, a Botin/Carkeek GP42, swapping the lead with him several times in only their second race in the boat.
MRV's Youth Superstars (Left to right), Felix Duell, Mats Maertens and Max O'Connell on MRV / Photo by Damien King
Max O’Connell, with Felix Duell and Mats Maertens were sailing their first race to Apollo Bay on MRV.
Adding yet another competitive dimension to the race, Max’s brother Jeremy O’Connell was onboard Ambition, with Max keen to pocket family bragging rights in his first M2AB race.
Max O’Connell reflected upon his first race and the tight tussle with Ambition.
“It was great fun, there were lots of challenging parts, especially the cold, it was very cold up on the rail, but when the sun came up, our spirits came up, and we could see boats around us and beneath us, it was just beautiful,” said O’Connell.
Max was in awe of the spectacular scenery and the competitive nature of the final race of the 2024-25 ORCV Offshore Sailing Program which saw only 55 seconds separating MRV and Ambition across the line, with MRV’s elapsed time 6 hours, 39 minutes and 40 second.
“About ten nautical miles out from the finish we knew we had a race on.
“We had Ambition on our hip, we were following them, and my brother was on the other boat.
“We talked about our options, to sit and hold second position or try for the win.
“We ended up in a tacking duel for about ten tacks over the last few miles.
“We knew Ambition would throw everything at us, and they did, but we just hit them straight back and managed to pull ahead to win,” said O’Connell.
MRV skipper Damien King was over the moon with his success in this year’s race and described his three new race recruits as “absolute legends”.
“Our strategy was to try and hold the rhumbline, we went out to sea a bit, but our plan was just to sail as fast as we could.
“We just love this race.
“It’s a perfect time of the year for this race, we’ve done it a bunch of times…we had great fun and are very happy to come away with line honours and the overall win.
“The race is a great length, we enjoyed starting in the middle of the night, there are different challenges with that, and to sail with three first timers onboard who are absolute legends, it’s just great,” said King.
Joining King and his newcomers on board MRV were Leeton Hulley, Grant Allen, Jonathan Orr, Dean Joel, David Suda and Mark Byrne.
While Ginan, the speedy J111 racing boat, missed out on the overall win, which is decided on AMS handicap, the seasoned sailors were very happy to take away the ORC overall win and the 2024-2025 ORCV Coastal Championship for the third year running.
Skipper McKenzie paid tribute to his entire team’s preparation and made specific mention of the time and effort of his “fabulous navigator” Greg Patten.
“Greg put a lot of time into understanding the race weather, looking at historical routes, understanding how wind shadows caused by the hills could affect us, and we looked at tracks of previous races.
“Because of Greg’s preparation, we were able to make some good tactical decisions today.
“And even though we were pushing the boat hard, we were still taking the time to admire the fabulous scenery along the coast, we are really luck to do what we do,” said McKenzie.
Onboard Ginan were Mark Jukes, Tim Bilham, William McKenzie, Jack Vermeer, Stephen Daniel and James Bacon.
Rounding out the overall results on AMS, Shimmer finished in second place behind MRV by just 32 seconds, with Ginan in third, while MRV and Shimmer finished behind Ginan on ORC overall.
Shimmer underway, living up to its name / Photo by Neil Bourne
Shimmer took out second place on PHS overall with Xenia, the X4.3 boat skippered by Koos Theron from SYC finishing in third.
Peccadillo, skippered by Charles Meredith from the Royal Melbourne Yacht Squadron, won line honours in the multihull division.
ORCV Race Director Ryan Blackstock was very happy with the race with all 28 competitors finishing in a reasonably good time.
“I think it was all fairly straightforward, nothing too out of the ordinary, although I did hear from some people after the race that the wind was fairly patchy around Lorne, but we had a consistent breeze on the finish line.
“And the race was probably a bit easier for some of the tailenders who had a better run to the finish line than the front markers who went a bit further south of the finish line and had to tack back towards us,” said Blackstock.
Joan Lorraine underway to the start line / Photo by Matthew Lee
In other provisional results, Alex Team-Macadie, skippered by Jock Macadie, won the Double-Handed PHS handicap from Sarah Allard’s Saltair and Foggy Dew, skippered by Robert Darcy, finished in third place. Joan Lorraine, skippered by Peter Garner took out the Division 2 Cruising PHS handicap.
The 2025 Melbourne to Apollo Bay Race was sailed with great spirit and camaraderie.
The Jackal on the way to Queenscliffe / Photo by Peter Grant
This year’s race welcomed several newcomers and a growing contingent of youth sailors and was a fitting end to the summer sailing season.
The fleet was joined by spirited pods of dolphins setting a cracking pace through the water along the Victorian coastline.
King and McKenzie joined many competitors who extended their thanks to the ORCV team for hosting this popular race and the broader offshore sailing program, and for generating coverage across media platforms that is inspiring new sailors.
“Thanks to the ORCV for putting these events on and for always being a fun and inclusive environment for all of us, we greatly appreciate it,” said King.
For full and provisional results across all divisions, click here.
