A changing of the guard took place in Hamilton Harbour at the weekend as Iain Jensen dethroned Artemis Racing team-mate Nathan Outteridge as MS Amlin “Dash for Cash” champion.

The Australian conquered strong 23 to 26 knot winds with gusts approaching 30 knots and a star-studded field to pocket $500 and a bottle of Gosling’s Black Seal Rum after all was said and done in the harbour on Saturday.

The strong winds made for some spectacular crashes with the skippers being catapulted from the 11-foot hydrofoiling Moth dinghy.

“I saw a top boatspeed over 30 knots,” Jensen, the Artemis wing trimmer, said. “I switched over to an Exocet boat about a year ago and it worked out really well today. It was nice to get one up on my skipper [Outteridge].”

The exhibition event is a prelude to the 2nd annual MS Amlin International Moth Regatta and features groups of Moth sailors racing in a shoot-out format, with the winner of each group advancing to a final grouping to determine the overall winner.

Outteridge, who won the gold medal with Jensen in the 49er at the 2012 Lonodn Olympics, finished second behind his compatriot and Artemis colleague.

“Iain was rock solid,” Outteridge said. “But if there’d been ten knots less breeze the racing would’ve been a lot more competitive.”

Stuart Bithel, of Britain, rounded off the podium in third.

“It was intense, awesome racing. Very windy,” Bithel said. “I survived and so did the boat, which is a bonus.”

While Saturday’s “Dash for Cash” went ahead as planned, yesterday’s strong winds resulted in the postponement of the opening day of the MS Amlin International Moth Regatta.

The race committee deemed the 20 and 25 knots winds with gusts approaching 30 knots and two to five foot seas in the Great Sound unsuitable for the Moth dinghy to race in.

Racing is scheduled to begin today at 11am with four races planned while Wednesday’s spare day is now a scheduled race day.

Rob Greenhalgh, of Britain, is the defending champion while carrying local hopes this year are Nathan Bailey, James Doughty, Richard Graham-Enoch, Josh Greenslade, Christian Luthi and Brett Wright.