In what was the closest Raja Muda Cup final in history as Nick Burns’s Witchcraft (a Mills King 40) defeated Rolf Heemskerk’s The

Next Factor (a Farr 40) by two seconds on corrected time in the final race and one second on corrected time in the penultimate race, winning the cherished chalice by one point overall and giving Burns his fourth Raja Muda title.

PRO Simon James staged two races on the final day of the Raja Muda Selangor In- ternational Regatta, held in Langkawi’s Kuah Harbour. With the wind blowing 12 knots, he set two rolling starts; the first, heading out at 11:25, for classes 1-3 (nine boats) on course 2, and the second for classes 4-6 (nine boats) on course 5. The second race, held at 12:35, had everyone doing course 11.

The Malaysian Navy’s Uranus, skip- pered by Hanif Husain, finished third in class one with 24 points, though it did take line hon- ours in the first two races. Steve McConaghy’s Aftershock (a Davidson 55) ended up in fourth spot, with 31 points.

In the two-boat class two (Premier IRC Cruising) Hans Rahmann’s custom-built Yasooda had a terrific regatta claiming line honours twice but when handicaps were applied only beat Peter Cremers’ Shatoosh (a Warwick 75) once by default in the last race.

Lee Yi Min’s Silhouette (a First 40.7) certainly was in no one’s shadow in this regatta winning all but one race in the three-boat class three (Sports IRC), finishing with 10 points. Steve Manning’s Red Rum One (an Archam- bault A4ORC) was second with 17 points
and Max Palleschi’s Prime Factor (a Farr 40)
in third with 21 points. After the regatta, Max announced that he will be taking his boat back to Australia to do some work on her, but will be competing in the Nongsa Neptune Regatta along the way.

The three-boat class four (Sports non- IRC) was won by Chris Mitchell’s Lady Bubbly (a Naut 40) as it captured six of the eight races in its class, finishing with 10 points overall. Karan Khara’s Sitka (a Sun Odyssey 429) was second with 15 points. Sonny Soh’s Lady Elluanne (a Jeanneau 54) finished third with 26 points, as it was unable to compete in three of the races.

If there was a “determination award” in the regatta Lady Bubbly certainly would have won it overcoming a number of difficulties, including a torn spinnaker and a bout of dehy- dration to its skipper.

The three-boat class five (Cruising non- IRC) saw Ramasamay Menon’s, VG Offshore (a Dehler 38) claim victory winning half of its races and finishing second in the other half for a total of 12 points. Amir Zohri’s Dash (a Yamaha 36) was second with 19 points; Dash had trouble with its shrouds, which made it unable to finish or compete in the last three races. Ken Yap’s Millennium 2 (a Hunter 326), dogged by engine trouble throughout the regatta, finished third with 16 points. As the regatta’s technical savant Malcolm Elliot said, “Ken is always the first to register, the first to pay and the last over the line.”

Jamil Urayah’s s Malaysian Navy Marikh (a Contesa 32) won six of the eight races in its di- vision to capture the three-boat class six with 11 points. Muhd Izarn’s Royal Malaysian Police’s Team Sham on Penarik (a Catalina 30) was sec- ond with four points behind claiming two class victories along the way. Shah Azlan Ramli’s To- fan (a Westerly Storm 33) finished third with 22 points. Dato Richard Curtis’ Eveline did not end up racing due to engine trouble but Richard was present at both the opening and closing parties.

The regatta’s technical guru Malcolm Elliot installed a YB3 tracker on each boat. This utilizes the Iridium satellite network, so the committee knows where each boat is during the passage races and what time they nish.