12:00a.m. 21st August 2008

Sunshine Coast schoolboy sailors have proved to be sailing masters, crewing their Dart SB3 sports boat Tasqua Youth to convincing results in the Meridien Marinas Airlie Beach Race Week championship on Pioneer Bay this week.

The crew of Matthew Jones, 17, Kris Blanch, 17, Sean Lindsell, 17, and Levi Curtis, 14, selected to represent the Oceanburo Youth Squad and the Mooloolaba Dinghy Sailing Club, has progressively matured to become the Dart SB3 class championship favourites when the final race is decided over the Whitsunday Sailing Club course today.

They entered this series with just one practice session off Mooloolaba before beginning the long road journey to Airlie Beach.

However despite being called the “Schoolboys” by their more senior and experienced rivals the Tasqua Youth Dart, SB3 has hit the major point score target in six of the eight races.

Naturally they are super energetic but they are obviously well coached and encouraged by the Oceanburo principles the 2007 Audi Australian IRC champions Rod Jones and Kai Timm.

Their personal enthusiasm and endless endurance paved the way for them to complete a very demanding test of fresh wind sailing skill on Tuesday when they left their rivals to sort out who were going to fill the minor places.

Skipper Matthew Jones sailed safely to win race six by two minutes 29 seconds from Wagop (Michael McLean), they then backed up to win race seven by a similar margin from Joe Akacich in Claaka.

Akacich cast a shadow over Tasqua Youth when he persistently tracked their course only to miss out on scoring an upset win by seven seconds in race 8.

After eight races Tasqua Youth crew with their commanding score of 2-1-1-1-3-1-1-1 hold a runaway lead, while the battle for the minor places has turned into a family duel between Bowen’s McLean brothers John in Marine Tech Electric and Michael in Wagop.

The McLean brothers are separated by just three penalty points which indicates the family feud could heat up on the course in the final today while the schoolboy sailors from the Sunshine Coast prepare to accept their deserved Meridien Marinas trophy as the Dart SB3 class champions for 2008.