This Saturday we have our Mid Winter Trophy race, our winter series is taking a short break for the school holidays. Our winter series will be on hold until the 17th of July when races 7 will be held with race 8 held the next week. Next week the Yacht Club are holding the Yachting Victoria Wintersail program and as such we will not be running any races.    

Those of you who sailed in the Annual Regatta may have noticed Lisa Hartnett out on the water taking photos of competitors. These were used as the trophies at the end of the regatta. The club has copies of all the photos up on our photos web site .

Behind the club the redevelopment of the Bob Jane Stadium is starting. This redevelopment will add an athletics track, additional grandstands, and much improved facilities. Once it is complete this facility will house the Victorian Institute of Sport , Athletics Victoria and the South Melbourne Football Club . Once redeveloped this track will be the premier athletics track in Melbourne and will replace Olympic Park (which is going to be demolished).

If you would like more details of exactly what is being built visit the following page on the Major Projects Victoria website . There is a YouTube video render of the architects impression for the facility.  

If you look at the photos and images of the stadiums you will notice that the land around the stadium is flat, and that will be the first change you will see behind us at the club. For the next 8 weeks the developers will remove 36,000 cubic meters of soil from around the South Melbourne Oval. This soil is going to be used to fill in 'dips' in the public space between the Carousel and the Grand Prix circuit.

After that soil has been removed work will start on building the two new grandstands, and the restoration of the Heritage Grandstand as a new home for the VIS. Near the entrance to our carpark will be built a warm up and practice facility. It is expected that this facility will be complete by the end of 2011.

For the club the biggest change will be the look behind the club. Instead of looking at a 'hill' we will see the back of the grandstands and into the corner coming onto the back straight of the athletics track. The redevelopment will make the lake busier, especially in summer. Thankfully most of the expected track meets will be during the week but there will be a number of events on Saturdays that may cause parking hassles. Hopefully we will be able to work with Parks Victoria to avoid any issues.

This development is going to further raise the profile of Albert Park. Nearly all of the major sports supported by the VIS will be based within the lake precinct, although sailing will be based out of Sandringham Yacht Club.  

Another item of business is we are looking to get some quotes to ensure the competitiveness of our cleaners. If you know of a good commercial cleaner we would be interested in getting a quote from them, please email This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it with the details.