Marine Rescue Middle Harbour – Open Day 2025
Join Marine Rescue Middle Harbour (MRMH) for its Open Day on Sunday, 19 October 2025, from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM AEDT at 239 Spit Rd, Mosman (The Spit Reserve). This free community event offers guided tours of MRMH’s new base and rescue vessels, plus the Marine Safety Expo showcasing the latest boating safety gear and expert advice.
The program includes:
• Live flare firing demonstration (11:00 AM)
• Simulated vessel rescue (11:30 AM)
• Lifejacket safety and servicing (12:00 PM & ongoing) – bring your own for checks
• CPR and AED demonstration (1:00 PM)
• MAYDAY distress call training (2:00 PM)
• Knot-tying, safety gear exhibits, and the Marine Rescue Log On app demo
A BBQ and refreshments will be available throughout the day. Attendees can also take advantage of special offers on marine safety products.
Registration is free but required via Eventbrite. Parking is available at Spit Reserve, and public transport options are nearby. Children are welcome but must be supervised at all times.
This event is perfect for boaters, sailors, kayakers, and anyone keen to learn practical safety skills while meeting the dedicated volunteers who keep Sydney Harbour safe.
Download the information poster here
Welcoming the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project to MHYC
Middle Harbour Yacht Club is proud to officially welcome the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project (SVSP) to the Club. CEO Andrew Forbes recently met with Jen and Scotty Reynolds, co-founders of the charity, to establish an agreement that will see Saltwater Veterans regularly sailing from MHYC.
The Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project is an ACNC-registered charity, an Australian Sailing affiliated club, and a mobile Discover Sailing Centre. Its mission is to empower current and former serving military veterans, and their families, through the social connection of sailing. The program is especially inclusive of wounded, injured and sick veterans, offering meaningful opportunities both on and off the water.
Members may recall MHYC s proud support of the ASX Refinitiv Charity Foundation Regatta, where the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project was one of the selected beneficiaries. With this new agreement, we re excited to extend that support even further and help the program thrive at our Club.
SVSP officially joined us for our 2025/26 Season Opening this past weekend, taking part in the Commodore’s Front Up Cup. You may also spot their crews out on the docks or sailing our club Melges 20s on Friday evenings as part of their Skills, Drills & Friday Chills adult coaching program - a development pathway designed to build confidence and race skills.
We are delighted to have the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project as part of the MHYC community and look forward to seeing their crews on the water throughout the season.
Wondering how you can support this project? As part of the ASX Refinitiv Charity Foundation fundraising campaign, the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project is currently selling raffle tickets, which directly contribute to their 2025/26 beneficiary donation from the ASXRCF . Members are warmly encouraged to support their charitable mission by purchasing some tickets, helping empower veterans and their families through sailing. Purchase your raffle tickets online here
Read more: Welcoming the Saltwater Veterans Sailing Project to MHYC
2025 Information & Education Sessions
Middle Harbour Yacht Club's Information & Education Sessions commenced in July and continues until October.
Some will be face to face while others will be conducted using Zoom videoconference. The updated schedule is:
- Wednesday 3 September - Racing Rules Refresher (Harbour View)
- Thursday 11 September - Skippers Briefing - Mandatory Session (Online)
- Thursday 25 September from 7pm - Skippers & Crew Meet and Greet (Harbour View)
- Wednesday 1 October from 6pm - Keelboat Safety Forum (Online)
- Saturday 11 October from 10am - MOB Practical Training Session (MHYC)
- Wednesday 22 October - Race Flags & Signals (Online)
To download the updated information flyer – click here
Spectacular MHYC Opening Day 2025-2026
Members and guests enjoyed a magnificent Opening Day for the 2025-2026 season on a beautiful warm and sunny spring day.
Following a welcome by Commodore Rob Aldis, Mike McEvoy was presented with Life Membership of the club in recognition of his tireless work as a volunteer, especially as a senior safety equipment auditor. This was followed by the naming cermony for the club's new start boat, Legacy. The boats in the Sail Past looked spectacular in the sunshine and soon after the Commodore's Front Up Cup got underway along with short course racing in the club's Melges 20s. Live music from Dallas O'Brien and The New Hip took a short pause for the prizegiving ceremony but continued to the end of the afternoon.
Altogether a great day enjoyed by all.
Opening Day Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin & David Staley
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Legacy Naming Ceremony Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin & David Staley
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Sail Past Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin
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Commodore's Front Up! Cup Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin
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Melges 20 Racing Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin & David Staley
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Prizegiving Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin
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MHYC Platinum Luncheon - 20 Year Plus Members
This year’s 20 Year plus Members Platinum Luncheon will be on Sunday 20th July from midday in the MHYC Harbour View Room.
The 2025 lunch promises to be entertaining with a great new cohort of members being inducted, together with some members being elevated into new brackets. Keynote speaker will be Elizabeth Tucker from Za Racing.
Tickets are available through TryBooking - CLICK HERE
Northbridge Sailing Club Open Day
Last sailing season, Middle Harbour Yacht Club and Northbridge Sailing Club started a collaborative program with the young sailors in MHYC’s Opti fleet joining Green and Open Fleet sailors from NSC to periodically race together. In the coming season, we hope to enable more junior sailors to build experience in larger fleet racing as a prelude to regattas.
The Northbridge Sailing Club Open Day is on Sunday 31 August. All are invited to go along to learn more about the club and, if you wish, bring a change of clothes for you and/or your child to go for a sail with an instructor.
Northbridge Sailing Club – igniting a passion for sailing
West of the Spit Bridge in the protected waters of upper Middle Harbour, Northbridge Sailing Club’s focus is family sailing in a range of dinghy classes or enabling a parent (or grandparent) sailor to introduce sailing to other family members via one of three sailing dinghy pathways.
- Learn to Sail – our programs for beginners are provided by our Australian Sailing certified instructors targeted for kids aged 7-12y, families and adults using Pacers and Optimist training dinghies on Sunday mornings. Junior sailors transition from accompanying instructors in Pacers to plastic Opti trainers to Green and Open fleet racing in Optis or Flying 11s.
- Social Sailing and Personal Coaching – membership benefits include inexpensive hourly rental of Pacers and ILCAs (Lasers) to enable adult members to build experience (with or without an instructor) or previous sailors to take their kids for a social sail or even let their more experienced kids take them!
We also encourage members new to sailing to join NSC club members in social yacht racing throughout the year. This complements their basic dinghy sailing experience so they can readily progress to become crew members for social sailing on yachts – feeding into twilight sailing or weekend racing.
- Afternoon racing – we race ILCAs (Lasers), two-handers (Tasars and NS14s, suited for two adults or parent/child crews or teenagers) as well as Moths with our open fleet of junior sailors in Optis and Flying 11s. The Flying 11 class enables 10-15 year olds to enjoy two handed racing together, or joining a parent in an NS14 or Tasar.
Our club is volunteer led and we strive to create a family friendly environment where fun on the water is foremost, supported by a community that helps each other. Our annual Live-In sailing camp for kids is legendary!
Tony Stephens, NSC Commodore
MHYC Women's Regatta
The MHYC Women's Regatta will be held on Saturday 10 May 2025.
The Open Keelboat divisions will be contested by yachts with all female crews and mixed crews with a female helm.
One Design divisions for mixed crews with a female helm are available for Melges 20, Adams 10, Yngling, J/24, J/70 and Elliott 7 classes with a minimum of four entries.
Commencing at 11am, two short windward-leeward races will be followed by a passage race starting at 1.30pm. Sailing will be conducted on the waters of Sydney Harbour and The Sound.
Join us back at MHYC after racing for some good company, drinks, nibbles and the presentation of prizes.
For race documents and online entry, visit the MHYC Event Page
Photos by Marg Fraser-Martin
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2025-2026 Program announced and Online Entry Open
Middle Harbour Yacht Club’s Sailing Program for 2025-2026 has been announced and online entry is now open.
While the printed Sailing Handbook for the new season will be available from the beginning of September, a detailed daily schedule and race documents for each of the MHYC series have now been published to the club’s website.
The program structure is largely unchanged from last season, with some minor amendments to race documentation and adjusted start times for some series.
The Saturday Inshore Annual Pointscore this year comprises ten Combined Clubs passage races, nine sprint races and the series kicks off on September 6 with a standalone inshore passage race using the club’s traditional inshore courses. The Combined Clubs Sunday Series run in conjunction with Manly Yacht Club is ten races for the coming season – six sprints and four passage races. Midweek is busy, especially in Summer, with 49 Wednesday non-spinnaker pursuit races, 24 Thursday Twilight pointscore races eleven Friday Spinnaker Twilight fleet races.
A new pricing scheme has been introduced, providing a substantial discount on series entries for MHYC Marine Berth and Mooring Holders.
For Online Entry – click here
To download a filterable excel spreadsheet of the MHYC 2025-2026 Sailing program – click here
To view the Notices of Race and Sailing Instructions for each MHYC Series – click here
Read more: 2025-2026 Program announced and Online Entry Open
Keelboat Prizegiving and Awards Night
Middle Harbour Yacht Club's Annual Keelboat Prizegiving and Awards Night will be held on Saturday 3rd May from 6.30pm.
Trophies are awarded and achievements recognised for Inshore and Offshore competition, the Twilight Series and Cruising Division. The hard work of officials, volunteers, committee members and staff are recognised along with the wonderful support of the club's sponsors.
Tickets are $30 and include a welcome drink and canapes.
Prizegiving will commence at 7pm sharp.
Book now via TryBooking.com
ORC Club Update
August 2025
MHYC is encouraging boat owners who don’t have an ORC Rating to apply for an ORC Club Certificate.
ORC is now the primary handicapping type for Saturday pointscore racing and an ORC pointscore based on elapsed times will be run in conjunction with the Pacific Rigging Wednesday Non-Spinnaker Series from the beginning of the new season.
The Sailing Committee is promoting ORC Club (ORCc) as the best option for all boat owners to obtain a Measurement Rating as it provides the right balance of science and simplicity to generate a handicap at a low cost.
Benefits:
- Easy Application Process - ORC Club requires a small number of measurement points and the ORC database already holds these measurements for over 128,000 production boats
- Fixed Handicap - ORC Club provides a constant reference point of a boat’s performance from week to week and allows identical boats to compete on the same handicap
- Boat Polars - the ORC Club Velocity Prediction Programme (VPP) calculates target boat speeds of each boat across a variety of wind strengths and wind directions
- Low Cost - It is inexpensive to generate an ORC Club certificate (in 2025 a new application for ORCc is $115 whereas ORCi is $650)
- Visibility - ORC Club is an open rule, so anyone can look at any other boats certificate and measurements that have been used. ORC Club also enables skippers to do a test to see what impact any changes to their boat or sails has on their handicap
- Popularity - ORC Club is widely used internationally and has seen rapid growth in Australia. The NSW ORC Championships are held each year
To assist owners with new applications, Australian Sailing’s Ratings Manager, Chris Zonca, will be at the club on Sunday 24 August (the final Get Checked Day this year for free safety audits) to provide information and answer questions about ORC Club and help with measurement.
Further details on ORC Club and other ratings can be found on the Australian Sailing website https://www.sailingresources.org.au/ratings-hub/.
Go to https://orc.org/sailors/active-certificates-database to search the ORC database for an existing ORC International or ORC Club certificate.
See the MHYC Handicapping Information Page at https://mhyc.com.au/sailing/keelboat-division/handicapping-at-mhyc.
Or contact the MHYC Sailing Office via email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 8969 3103.
Nominations open for MHYC Special Awards
with Past Commodore Julie Hodder
Nominations are now invited for three Special Awards for the 2024-2025 Season – the Tig Thomas Distinction Trophy, the Crew Member of the Year Award and the Jules Trophy for the MHYC Yachtswoman of the Year.
To be eligible for the Tig Thomas Trophy, a Senior, Full, Sailing or Youth member must have competed in a State, National or World Championship, Major Regatta or Major Ocean Race within the last year (1st April to 31st March). Candidates can be nominated either by a Senior, Sailing or Full member, or self-nominate.
The Crew Member of the Year 2024-2025 is presented to an esteemed crew member, displaying the characteristics desirable of a MHYC Member, someone other crew members would aspire to emulate, and nominated from a yacht competing in a MHYC Pointscore Series Program.
The Jules Trophy for MHYC Yachtswoman of the Year will be awarded to a member who sails regularly from MHYC, is enthusiastic and active participant in the sport of sailing and shows good seamanship and sportsmanlike conduct.
All nominations must be submitted no later than 5pm on Friday 18th April 2025.
Awards will be announced at the MHYC Annual Prizegiving on Saturday 3rd May 2025.
To download the Tig Thomas Trophy Nomination Form – click here
To download the Crew Member of the Year Nomination Form – click here
To download the Jules Trophy Nomination Form – click here