It was a cracking day at the Club today – very Westerly, B Rigs… often top end!! I was in three layers and still had to go and get a jacket on!! We had a terrific fleet of six Marbleheads with a seriously intense level of competition. Five of the fleet were F6s and Graham B was our guest of honour!!
We shall have full results in due course from HM, but it’s fair to report that there were some cracking races in the ten race programme. In terms of sheer speed, in the often wavy conditions, the Commodore’s F6 was totally on fire – around half the races won, and at least two of them were runaways! We shall see how the points turn out though as Nigel B’s F6 was fabulously consistent as well as fast. Hugh M sailed a couple of proper fire-crackers too. The starts were an interesting call in the westerly and generally the game played out close up along the wall for us all to see. Graham H made several superbly good starts, and racing was altogether pretty close. Often the lee end of the line along the wind curve of the wall was surprisingly quick – and Phil H split from the fleet out in the bay using this routing pretty often in his excellent morning.
A strong fleet of two dozen competitors from far and wide, including Germany, lined up at Datchet for a terrific weekend’s racing. “Ranking 1” was held on Saturday and “Ranking 2” was run on Sunday. Each day was scored as a separate event.
The weather ran the whole spectrum that Datchet can provide. Saturday had gentle breezes, 5-10mph, and the fleet raced on A-Rigs in the main. On the Sunday, we had 12-20mph with 40mph gusts . The competitors used every rig that they had brought with them and Sunday was a complete blast of a day.
(Radio Sailors having Fun!!)
(Radio Sailors having a whale of a time!)
(Darin, on Observer duty!)
On Saturday, our 2024 National Champion, Darin Ballington, sailed a superb and consistent day. In a 14 heat, 7 race programme, Darin scored a superb three wins of seven and discarded a 6th. Just seven points behind was Graham Bantock with 18 points and two wins. Graham had a constant tussle with Craig Richards of the home Club who scored one win and discarded an 11th. It was a very technical and challenging day with many star performances in the fleet, but special mention should go to the two entrants from Germany, Henning Faas and Nigel Winkley. Henning and Nigel both put in strong top ten performances and gave advance warning of their potential on the windier second day.
(Setting Sun with Windsor Castle in the Distance)
A special prize for the most helpful and team-spirited competitor went to Tracey Ballington.
If the Wind Gods were taking the day off on Saturday, then just to remind us all who’s Boss, they returned with a vengeance on Sunday. Before Skipper exhaustion set in, the Fleet managed twelve heats, six races. The fleet started at B Rigs, and progressively went to ever more conservative rigs as the wind stepped up … and up. By the final race, the boats were flying.
Henning Faas from Germany in his Niou Niou design Marblehead had a superb day – recording straight 4ths in the first four races leaving him very strongly placed by early afternoon. However, there was a battle royal in progress. Darin Ballington, with his Grunge design, continued his fantastic form of Saturday and took race 5 with a superb win. The star of the day and winner of Ranking 2, (by some margin) was 2023 Champion, Craig Richards sailing his F6. Despite the weather blowing the fleet across the lake, Craig recorded 4 wins in 6 races, discarding a 3rd.
Tracey Ballington had the race of her life on Sunday recording a very popular B fleet win at speed and handsomely beating Darin Ballington into second place. It must be said, there were huge cheers at the finish!!
(Tracey Ballington at the Prizegiving on Saturday – Race Committee Special Prize)
The Race Committee’s special prize for Sunday was awarded to Lewis Wyeth of Gosport. Despite having to withdraw from racing, Lewis piled in to help the race team in the very testing conditions. It was pretty cold out on that RIB !
A skippers conference was called around 3.30pm under rapidly darkening skies and the event closed at six races. At both prizegivings, special thanks were given to the whole race team for their efforts to make the two days successful.
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