We had a good fleet of IOMs on Sunday. We had nine put their names down in WhatsApp, and possibly eight or seven in attendance. And Boy… did it blow!! We went out on B Rigs and later moved to C Rigs.
The club was bustling with an inter-university team race championship so there were firefly dinghies zooming all over the place. At 11am the proper gusts (40-50mph) were meant to arrive. I happened to be standing on the end of the pontoon when the first squall arrived – practically blew me off my feet. The Club lifejacket rule makes sense!
As the students came in, so do did our B rigged fleet. We all huddled in the clubhouse, then suddenly Craig, Nigel and Dorian fancied a C rig outing and off they went. Immense fun to watch.
It was a simply stunning day at Datchet Water today – incredible bright light, with blue skies and B Rig breezes,… occasionally top-end!!
Given it was Father’s Day, we had a super One Metre turn out as well – nine competitors on the water and the camaraderie-index felt extremely high – a good time! It was nine competitors even though our fantastic leaders … and regular sailors…, PH and HM, were absent.
We have had good membership growth this year and interestingly it’s at both ends of the fleet – growth in the “superheroes” and also growth in the…. “Corinthian” …end of the fleet. It all made for great atmosphere and friendship.
Without HM and PH we were naturally a tad less organised. DL was our speaking start-clock for a few races while we sourced a race timer on somebody’s phone. I’d guess we put in five races before the break and maybe 7 races after – but I don’t think we were quite organised enough the record the scores and nobody seemed to mind today! Racing itself was in no way informal (!), but intensely competitive at all levels. Learned a lot, …speaking personally!!
We started the day on the south course, then a quick skippers meeting shifted the racing to the north course. We sailed the boats across, while walking across the beach chatting in small groups – great entertainment!
We did a couple of races on the north side and came to realise that there is more to this Race Officer and course laying lark than you might imagine – thank you Hugh for everything you do !! So we reverted to the south side again until end of session. It was a miracle that we didn’t need to get the RIB out!
I guess we don’t get to sail on our B Rigs all that often. (First time ever for me!!) We had great Datchet waves in the stiff SW breeze, so there was plenty to learn about tacking efficiently and surfing downwind in these conditions. NB brought along his new developmental IOM rudder … so we shall all have plenty to talk about at dinner parties for the next month or so!! Amazing – take a look if you can!
Datchet Radio Sailing - Making It All Much Easier !! 