Nigel and Craig went North with Jim for the weekend and had a fantastically close weekend at West Lancs, …especially on the Sunday. They all made a lovely job of it!!
Take a look at that scoreline. Nigel and Craig took a 1,2….Most of us had to get the Tie Break rule explained to us AGAIN!!
You might have thought it a grey and damp weekend! It didn’t stop us having cracking racing and a full programme for the UK Ten Rater Rankings 1&2!!
Saturday was a little wet until lunch time, but across the day HM packed in a full 16 race programme. Racing on the north course was great – safely out of the way of the rather huge youth training event at the main club!
It was a super win from a dominant Graham Bantock (22pts) from Austin Guerrier (25 pts) and Rohan Williams, who was going jolly fast in his new Trance… on 34 pts.
Best Dressed Skipper of the Day Award : New boat needs new and coordinated Helly Hansen wardrobe!! Terrific kit all round! (Ed : severe kit envy from me)
The second day, Ranking 2 , was a proper nail biter. David Lindsay, sailing his new Ten (new from Ante winning the worlds in it!!) really set the morning on fire!! The morning breeze was quiet and we only got four races in before chilli con carne – and David found the Croatian “power button” and won thee of them!! Unfortunately for David, he had to depart for Sweden after lunch leaving the whole thing wide open again!
The breeze cooperated and PRO McAdoo crammed in another 8 races before frankly competitors and race team were ready to call the whole weekend a wrap…. but wow was it close racing. Constantly battling it out were Graham Bantock and Austin Guerrier – with our very own Austin grabbing it by a single point just at the end. Gripping stuff !!
Two Trance skippers, Austin (68) and Rohan (73)
We honestly had a whole number of text book starts during the weekend.
Phil getting the Blade into gear….
Graham Working on The Proteus Project while scoring
Great fleet and great Team Datchet turn-out today. A super 21 boat fleet with 6 of our members! Racing was jolly competitive to put it mildly. The Datchet club was hosting inter University team racing today (near the shore, so a challenge for our little race courses) plus an RYA Youth event ……the general consensus was “lets go to Chipstead instead”!!
It was light and wispy from the south…. very tense!! Typical Chipstead southerly !!! Nigel and Craig sailed superbly to finish 2nd and 3rd respectively. The event was won by a wonderfully consistent Peter Stollery. Always up the front!!
Phil – who had to leave for home early – also put in some great numbers. By mid morning we’d had a couple of Datchet 1-2-3’s . Harry will be pleased as punch and our Jim found himself so far out front in one race he had a champions aura about him!!
(Phil’s Proteus)
(Chipstead, as ever, pretty as a picture…!)
Datchet Radio Sailing - Making It All Much Easier !! 