Category Archives: General

Datchet IOM Worlds – Coming Up….!!

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It’s 3rd June. About ten days after the Worlds.

We are nearing the end of duties now. For myself, I’ve put the scoring systems away (the team are having a lie down!) and I am working hard to close the Championship accounts, …and already we are helping re-use the Worlds legacy knowledge to support Jim and the boys running the DF65 Nationals this weekend coming. Good luck to the East Kent Members at Barton’s Point !

In the rear view mirror, you get to appreciate how much we have learned putting many months of hard work behind us. In the coming days and weeks we shall look to reflect and digest – and place some of our knowledge on this website to help other Clubs run their events. In coming weeks, we are thinking of reporting to you on:-

  • the Robot Race-Buoys Age has finally arrived. What’s the Business Case?
  • the Amazing IOM2026 dedicated Website
  • Parallel Scoring : how to plan you’ll actually reach the last day… with flawless and audited results
  • Live-streaming and What we Learned
  • Making the Commentators’ life slightly easier : hand held tech commentary aids
  • The Hugely Important Role of Volunteers, How to Pull It All Together
  • What Drives Cost to run a Championship at this scale
  • How to Plan and Execute a Regatta at this Scale
  • Those Amazing Worlds Trophies provided by Robot Yachts – What it takes to Design and Make Trophies like that (if I can talk Tony and James into telling us!)
  • AI and writing Press reports quickly !! (Yes – a lot of what you read was AI generated !! Frighteningly good.)
  • Flags, banners, special flags and …. Flagpoles!
  • Campsite Management and building an enduring Club Asset
  • Scrutineering and Workflow
  • WhatsApp : Totally Central to Organising and Running a 2026 Championship
  • Special Technologies that can lend a hand : Satellite Comms, Waterproof Tablets, Portable Credit Card Readers, Buoybots, RTK, Application of AI – and more
  • Just how much do 84 competitors and 40 volunteers drink in a hot week?
  • Auditable International and Domestic Banking … not as trivial as you’d think
  • Do we learn anything for the Future of Our Sport

If there is anything else you’d like to hear about, simply let his know via the Contacts page of this website.

Datchet IOM Worlds – Hull Designs – An Embarrassment of Riches !!

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We are somewhat spoiled for choice, don’t you think??

We have three major builders dominating the fleet with around a quarter of the fleet a piece. Hugely mixed results and they are all terrific! 2026 was a brilliant year for one of the strong contingent of V12s to win – a poignant note to mark Ian Vickers’ departure from life.

And how old is the BritPOP! design now?? Amazing – and the 2026 GBR National Champion sailed one of the first three to be built! How terrific is that!! 12% of this fleet in 2026 :).

Plus, I have a feeling that the K2R is one of the first K2’s built.

Then if the original IOM Charter was to encourage new designs, just look at that! Proteus and the other unique designs were almost 20% of the fleet.

A special note about Craig Richard’s Proteus. As a project, it seems like it has only been going 5 minutes and already three boats entered into the Worlds. In fact, Craig sailed his Proteus to two 1st Places during the 18 race worlds. Brilliant, really brilliant !! For those of us at Datchet who have lived through the Proteus story – especially David and Nigel, it’s quite something – for Craig and for 3D printing technology. We shall be hearing more and more of Proteus, I’m sure.

Superb – An embarrassment of riches. A golden era is upon us !?!

Datchet Club’s 50th Anniversary….!!

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It was our host Club’s 50th Anniversary celebrations this weekend!! Good to feel part of it with them. They combined a few onshore celebrations with the 2026 Club Championships out on the water. Racing was greeted by a misty 5mph breeze, but looked pretty intense !!

Onshore there was meant to be a charity walk around the Reservoir (about 3 miles) but amazingly permission was withdrawn by the landlord – pity! Still we had the ladies run a Hospice shop – great jigsaws on sale!

The upstairs had been properly decorated and was looking great for the Championship prize giving not to mention the Bake Off Competition!

As it happens, five key members of Datchet Radio Sailing were competing away from home, leaving us somewhat depleted. The cool misty day would not have helped either – it wasn’t all that alluring!!

To make up for it, Graham brought a couple of stunning boats from his personal collection – with Howard and Richard there to give a hand, plus Phil consulting on the phone!. By the way, Richard 30 years a member and Howard even more than that !

The first was this amazing radio gaff rig cutter – quite a size actually. Superb craftsmanship as you’d expect – one of four built to the 15 metre rule for a group at Frensham. Technically very interesting to sail as there were three radio channels – main and jib sheets being on separate channels of the left joystick. (RJ thinking about some areas where the radio can help out – the joystick for jib sheet goes in different directions on starboard and port!)

Was this the first time a gaff rig had been seen at Datchet ?? Maybe!

The second boat was a converted Vane Ten Rater built to the old rule. That’s the one that stole my heart today – a gorgeous complete rebuild and running on radio now. Stunning and a whopping size. Stupidly I didn’t get photos of that as I had my IOM on the water on “rescue” duty in case we lost the gaff cutter … which happened a few times on saturday!! A small matter if the mainsheet not staying on the winch drum as intended!!