On a grey evening, initially with a SW Force 2 wind, a course of (4)-0-A-4 was posted. Sixteen boats took to the water including five from the Topper Fleet.
But the wind dropped away down the beat and there was virtually nothing by the time the lead boats reached the windward mark. There was clearly only going to be a single lap. Those successful on rounding and on the return legs included David Haselden in the Solo and Jim Christie in his Supernova. . They crossed the line in the leading group to be classified in the podium positions on Fleet Handicap behind the GP of Mike Fairlamb / Eric Smith who lead that series.
On Personal Handicap David took first place ahead of Mike/Eric with Paul Clark in his Laser third.
The Toppers had the most demanding time as it was dead calm at zero by the time most reached it. All retired except Louise Roger who was first around the mark and determined she was going to Finish. It took her a time of fifty eight minutes to do so but she gets full credit for determination.
During another excellent meal the heavens opened. All agreed that it could have been a lot more disagreeable if they had done so earlier.
Ne’er cast a clout till the May is out – so true! The forecast wall to wall sunshine was nowhere to be seen, and the light winds were cold.
With the Catapult fleet having their open meeting with us again, there was a great turnout of boats. The winds eased as the afternoon progressed.
Tog coaxed Joanie out in the RS200 again, and despite his frustrations seeping through, she was still smiling at the end! It was Robbie D that built up a good lead, but when the handicaps were applied, Banter, newcomer Ian Hall, and Alastair were hot on his heels finishing within 29secs of his corrected time. In the 2nd race, Robbie D again took the honours, with Jim C 2nd, and Mik, with no comps torus in the Mirror/Topper fleet, finishing a few secs later in 3rd place.
Mike/Kayla won the 1st F15 race but in the 2nd race, Ian/Lezli-Ann kept the wind to take the lead, and advantage of the shortened course (though they were hoping it would have been shortened earlier). Dave/Lynn won both GP races from Mike/Eric
There could be a bit of hot air this evening with entertainment comprising Chilli followed by a rules talk/discussion by Eddie Ramsden. Will everyone be fired up to protest on the water tomorrow?
Fatherhood – when needs mustClaire was treated to an early birthday celebration
Sunday offered slightly milder, but much stronger and gustier winds. Although there were various capsizes, and several near misses, the good reaching conditions and close racing made it an enjoyable race for many. For some reason sheep syndrome took over and several boats went around the leeward mark the wrong direction (consistently) and so were giving DNF.
Lucy was crewing for Alastair, but not amused that they capsized on their way ashore. Perhaps they’d let their guard down…
After lunch there were another two races that were certain to tire many out, especially as the wind continued to blow with some wild gusts at times.
Alastair/Lucy crossed the finish line only to be flattened by one of the gusts – did it blow Alastair’s hat off too?
Izzy (or is it Hazel?) and Harry put in gutsy performances in their Toppers coping with several capsizes, finishing two of the races, and retiring in the final one of the day. Despite some close racing, Harry took two firsts and currently leads the series.
Scumper/Zefer kept Robbie D/Banter at bay taking 3 wins and the overnight lead in the handicap fleet, while Paul is in 3rd place. Dave/Lynn recovered from their mark rounding mistake in the first race to win the next two races and overnight lead ahead of Alan/Sue.
The F15s had some close racing, sharing the wins between Mike/Kayla, Simon/Jon and Neil/Tog meaning everything was to sail for on Monday for which the forecast was more of the same, though with the wind from the SSE. Indeed there was a good SSE wind on Monday, but it wasn’t as gusty. The wind direction suited some courses that made use of the southern end of the lake. Birthday boy Simon sailed with his sensible head to win both races and the F15 series with Mike/Sally and Neil/Tog each getting second to finish 2nd and 3rd overall respectively.
Despite some strengthening competition from Val/Ken who are quickly getting to grips with their new boat, Dave/Lynn took another couple of firsts (and the Lyne Tankard), with Val and John each taking a 2nd place, but AJ’s first on Sunday secured him 2nd overall ahead of Val.
Whether it was the less gusty conditions, or the longer beats, John Reekie mastered his Musto Skiff to win both races in the handicap fleet. Robbie D and Shunty each had a second position, but Scumper’s 3rd place was more than enough to win him the May Holiday trophy when combined with his three wins from Sunday.
Commodore Andy sailed, and won, one race each with daughters Lily and Katia, but it was Harry’s consistent performance over the two days that earned him the Peel Pot ahead of Hazel.
There was more consistent results from Gareth Ede giving him a clear lead in the Catapult open, but some more close racing led to there being only 3 points separating 2nd to 4th places, with John Terry securing 2nd overall.
One of the things that has survived the move to Chipping Norton is the Easter tradition of the egg dump.
Both Chris and Andrew and family were with us on Easter Sunday with children and my brothers family happily made 16.
I remembered that Ken Bell had told me that it would be easy to win the egg dump. All you had to do was bring your own “ringer” a free range egg which would have a stronger, thicker shell.
So off I went to Tesco to buy some cage eggs and up the road to buy some eggs from a guy in the village. The draw was rigged so all the children had free range eggs and all the grown ups cage eggs.
And the result – my 30 yr old niece won with a cage egg and there were tears !!
Peter
And just to show we’re still sailing, a week on Monday Toni & I are off for a 9 day sail in the Azores
Entries for the first round of the season long Night Jar Series are usually a little sparse. But, on this occasion, regular competitors were supplemented by nine Trainees or beginners giving a total of eighteen boats on the water.
The evening was warm and dry with an extremely light NE wind. With calm patches around the bay, race officer Ian Macpherson chose a clockwise course starting upwind of 0 with a beat to 1, a close reach to B and a long run as the final leg.
The Skiff of John Reekie took an early lead and completed the lap in 17 minutes. So, when given the option, he requested a further circuit. He was followed some 10 minutes later by the four GP14’s and Ethan Dawson’s Radial and, with the wind dropping near the Bassenthwaite shore, a shortened course was signalled at 0.
Mike Fairlamb / Ken Bell were first of the group to cross the line followed closely by John Riley / Nigel Lewis. However, the wind was shifting SE and both Alan Jones / Sue Watson and Kath Davis / Glenys Kett were pushed into 0 when rounding resulting in turns.
The trainees and beginners were receiving on the water instruction from Robbie Dawson and six completed the course with Julie Tomkinson and Peter Winfindale in Radials finished in under 38 minutes. Izzi Hunter in her Topaz Uno crossed the line just ahead of Morgan Glass who was helming the first Topper to finish. Congratulations to all who were attempting their first Club race.
GNAC 2014 is less than a couple of weeks away and we have decided to offer a £5 discount for early entries made through our WebCollect online portal. This discount is available until Bank Holiday Monday 21 April so don’t put it off too long!
Blue skies, rainfree, but windy weather was the order of the day for the start of this weekend’s Fleet Challenge which is being run on a pursuit basis.
Altohugh the tops of the waves were not obvious when looking down the wind this week, only five helms put their names down to enter and obtain start times, of which only two decided to start in the first race, namely AJ/Sue and Mike/Kayla, both sailing in F15s.
AJ started first, though not taking full advantage of his 4 min head start, and he held he lead for 3/4 of the race despite not flying a spinnaker.
Dave/Mike F noted the winds had eased slightly and sailed the 2nd race starting 1 min ahead of AJ and 5 min head of Mike. Mike again passed AJ by making good use of the spinnaker legs, but then had to chase Dave. However, various broaches slowed him down and he was unable to catch Dave within the allotted 50 mins.
On Sunday the weather must have seemed more sailable as there were 8 starters in the morning race, though once on the water the wind freshened slightly, and there were some capsizes even before the start. Mike/Eric started first and held their lead for the first half of the race.
Andy/Phil had the sharpest start of all, with Dave/Lynn closely behind. Andy did break through to the lead but a problem with the spinnaker halyard caused him to drop back a couple of places from which he never fully recovered.
Banter found the conditions challenging in his RS100, and his numerous capsizes tiring, but he was glad to have been out!
In the final 10 mins (or so) of the race Mike/Kayla took the lead, and the winning position with Dave/Lynn 2nd
Another two races were scheduled for after the lunch break. Andy/Phil had more gear failure and retired just before the start. Dave/Lynn capsized on the first spinnaker leg leaving Mike/Eric to lead the way in their GP. The heavy conditions suited the F15s and they took the first three positions half way through the race, which left Steve/Ruth and Scumper/Banter chasing the pack for pole position. As the Bates headed out to shorten the course, mark 0 became tangled in its prop so the race was shortened in an unconventional manner slightly ahead of schedule! Fortunately the sailors were tired enough to be happy to accept the result and bring the series to an early conclusion as they were generally too shattered to sail the 5th race.
Mike/Kayla won the race, taking the series trophy, and AJ came 2nd.
With a slight break in the wet weather, work has begun on regrading the back camping field to improve run off and reduce the risk of flooding during Bass Week
Just to reassure everyone, WebCollect is NOT and was NEVER vulnerable to the “heartbleed” bug in OpenSSL, because it never used the vulnerable version of OpenSSL.
Is it recommended that you or your members change your WebCollect password? Not any more than usual. If you are using the same password for WebCollect as you were for another service which was vulnerable to Heartbleed, then your password may have been compromised with that other service. In this case it would make sense to change your WebCollect password as well.
We have put an announcement on the WebCollect home page to this effect.
Note from Pete Nuttall
