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DF65 & DF95 Social Racing 2024 – 17/4/24

DF65’s

North West breeze today blowing straight down the lake, or as near as, resulting in quite a popple on the water at the club end where the gate marks were situated. Quite cold on arrival and no one seemed keen to go for a wade, but the start line and the beat looked very fair, with a single windward mark but no spreader. This clearly meant that the leading pack had to navigate their way through the boats still on the beat, but this seemed to work well. In fact there were more boat to boat incidents elsewhere on the course as the some of the heavier gusts affected boat handling.

Initial thoughts of A rig changed quickly to B rig which proved to be the right choice over the morning. As always there were some flat spots and lulls, and the heavier gusts were just at the top end of B rig conditions but quite manageable.

Malcolm Harvey very kindly offered to RO the morning’s racing – thank you Malcolm – and Dave Williams stormed away to win the first race, followed by Mike who won the next two and Simon who won race 4.

Once again racing was much closer than the end results might suggest, with some big gains to be made – or lost – coming up from the gate to the finish depending on which gate mark was taken. Despite the strength of the breeze there were some significant shifts all through the mornings sailing making it a day to keep your competitors covered.

Mike was able to win 4 of the next 5 races to win overall, with Clive and Sally also winning races in another very competitive 10 races for the 65 fleet.

Thanks again to Malcolm for ROing, and to Malcolm and Dave for sorting out the results which were as follows:

  1. Mike de St Paer    10 pts         6 wins
  2. Simon Bates          37 pts         1 win
  3. Clive Warren         38 pts         1 win
  4. Andrew Potter      38.5 pts
  5. Dave Williams      45 pts         1 win
  6. Neil Westbrook    47 pts
  7. Alan Watkinson   48 pts
  8. John Beech             50 pts
  9. Dave Howard         51.5 pts
  10. Sally Collings         52 pts 1 win
  11. Paul Plested            53 pts
  12. Frans King               60 pts

DF95’s

11 skippers were treated to a great afternoon sail, the sun shone and took the edge off the north westerly breeze blowing down the lake from the non clubhouse end with a bit of bias from the industrial estate.

The choice of rig was B rig which turned out to be the right choice although it was top end and touching a C rig in some of the gusts. The wind was fairly steady but there were a few gusts that could catch the unaware helm out downwind, matched with a few shifts (not as many as usual) and it was a fabulous afternoon for 95 sailing.

The course was similar to the morning but the first mark was slightly further up the lake to make the course slightly longer. A mixture of 1 and 2 lap races were sailed with a total of 8 races completed. Normal afternoon format applied with self monitoring starts and first to finish taking note of the finishing positions.

Racing was as competitive as ever in the 95 fleet with 7 helms recording a top 3 place. Paul Little had an afternoon to forget with various boat and rig issues limiting him to only 2 finishes.  John C took the honours in the opening race after a close tussle with Clive and Paul P, and the second race was more of the same with the finishing order reversed. Clive then took the next two with John B notching up a 3rd place in what was a consistent set of results hovering just outside the top 3. Paul P then got his second win, before Mike dSP finally got the hang of his new B rig finishing 1,2,1 in the last 3 races. Overall a great afternoon sailing in near perfect conditions for a B rig.

Final results

  1. Clive Warren          9pts  3 wins
  2. Paul Plested          15pts   1 win
  3. Mike De St Paer   18 pts  2 wins
  4. John Carlin            21pts    1 win
  5. John Beech            24pts
  6. Alan Watkinson  27pts
  7. Frans King            34pts
  8. Dave Howard       35pts
  9. Neil Westbrok      41pts
  10. Malcolm Harvey 50pts
  11. Paul Little              68pts

DF/RG65 Summer Series 2024 #1 – 13/4/24

8 skippers all sailing RG65’s turned up for a 1pm start, we all sailed the first race in swing A rigs but with some really vicious gusts appearing everyone decided to go down a rig for race 2. The direction the wind was coming from was from all points of the compass or as we like to say at Birkenhead, Tescos, clubhouse, factories and houses winds.
We sailed another 4 races until calling a tea break in the hope the wind direction would settle, it didnt.
Another 2 races after tea and we were all sent back to the clubhouse to change down yet again.
The racing was close in most races and resembled a piece of elastic as the leaders fell into holes allowing the chasing pack to catch up.
Graham sailing his Electronica had the lions share of the wins (7) with John sailing his Ivy winning the other 3, Bill who normally challenges for the lead was unfortunately not getting used to his new radio gear and had a bit of a miserable day for his standards, Alan suffered in the final 5 races with rig size but George sailing an Uno really turned it round in the final 5 races with a 6,4,2,2,5 finish, well done George in very trying conditions, George is only 9years old by the way.
  1. Graham Elliott       ELECTRONICA   9POINTS
  2. John Brierley           IVY                         15
  3. Alan Bennet             IVY                         20
  4. Bill Culshaw             IVY                         37
  5. Alan Watkinson      UNO                      38
  6. George Bennet        UNO                       43
  7. Dave Williams         UNO                       50
  8. Charles Legg            UNO                       55

DF65 & DF95 Social Racing 2024 – 10/4/24

DF65’s

Spring has (allegedly) sprung, but there wasn’t much evidence of it at Gautby road this morning, where arriving sailors were greeted by a rising S.Easterly breeze, persistent rain and a temperature of around 7deg C. Not a great Spring day.

On the up side there was a bit of breeze, and early launchers returned to say that A+ should actually be A, and even then there were some chunky gusts at the top end of A rig. The resident fishermen started to pack up straight away and were no problem at all.

The usual course was used, other than that one of the gate marks was missing and it was agreed simply to do a port hand leeward mark rounding. Strangely no one seemed keen to go for a paddle and replace the mark.

There were 11 skippers to start – a good turnout given the unpromising conditions – and after a small delay while everyone changed rigs Dave Williams got the racing started.

The first three races had three different winners, and the final beat up from the bottom mark proved tricky to get right. The starting line looked port end biased from the lake edge but proved to be a good compromise. Mike and John then shared the remaining 5 races between them with Mike just running out the winner.

Sally had boat trouble after only two races but very kindly stayed on to RO the rest of the morning. Thank you!

Clive managed three races, but then after sorting out what looked like a rudder servo problem returned to race; unfortunately with the hatch not completely sealed. His boat partially sank, but was fortunately close to the bank and nudged ashore safely, which ended his day. Dave Howard arrived late and only completed one race before having to fix a rigging issue. All in all an eventful mornings racing.

Racing was closer than the results might suggest, with places being swapped right up to the line. Final results as shown below with thanks to Dave and Malcolm for sorting them out, and thanks again to Sally.

  1. Mike de St Paer          7.2pts      4 wins
  2. John Carlin                 10 pts        3 wins
  3. Neil Westbrook         17 pts
  4. Paul Plested               22 pts
  5. Dave Williams          30 pts         1 win
  6. Frans King                 30 pts
  7. Richard Walker        32 pts
  8. Malcolm Harvey     46 pts
  9. Clive Warren             50 pts         3 races
  10. Sally Collings            63 pts         2 races
  11. Dave Howard            64 pts         1 race

DF95’s

Following a morning of wetness with a chilly wind only 4 brave skippers got their boats rigged for the afternoon, the weather forecast and Easter holidays putting a lot of people off. As it turned out, the afternoon weather forecast didn’t materialise and the rain stayed away. The wind eased slightly from the morning making the A rig a perfect choice, the generally South Easterly direction remained similar to the morning, with the normal shifts and holes associated with Gautby Rd to keep the helms on their toes, it was very easy to pick a bad shift and end up head to wind, loosing meters.
Paul martialled the start line and the first home recorded the scores.
8 races were sailed, a mixture of one and two lap, Paul started as he meant to go on taking the first 2 races, before Clive stepped up to take the 3rd. Meanwhile after taking a second in the first race Dave managed to tune his boat to a standstill and took time out to make some rigging adjustments in the clubhouse. Race 4 and Paul was on top again before Mike got in on the act taking race 5. Once again Paul took line honours in races 6 and seven before Mike won the final race. All races were very close between the boats with the lead changing hands regularly in most races but it was Pauls day who had his boat set up just right and mastered the conditions with 5 wins.
1,   Paul Plessed      –    5 wins
2.   Mike de St Paer  –  2 wins
3.   Clive Warren       –   1 win
4.   Dave Howard

Club Successes at the Marblehead Ranking Races 2 & 3

Over the weekend of 6th & 7th April, Marblehead Ranking Events 2 & 3 took place at Fleetwood MYPBC.  Both days supplied gusty breezes that started diagonally across the lake and straightened as the day progressed.

On Saturday the club had entries from two club members; Brad Gibson sailing his own and latest design a Grunge, with Martin Roberts sailing Andrea’s Starkers Squared – a design that is 31 years old and a boat that is 22 years old competing on equal terms.  They filled the top two positions with Brad first and Martin second.

On Sunday unfortunately only Brad was representing the club, but once again he took the overall win.

This coming weekend has the first two IOM Ranking events being held at Eastbourne with Brad and Peter Baldwin competing.

Winter Series are Complete – Summer Series Start on 13th April

All of the 2023/4 Winter Series are now complete and the overall results for each class are currently shown on the Current Standings page.  When at least a couple of events for each class are completed in the Summer series for 2024, these results will be moved to a dedicated page and link for 2023 in the Results Tab.  The podium positions for each class and the attendance numbers are as follows:

IOM Winter 2023/4

  1. Brad Gibson        Post Punk    300    pts
  2. Graham Elliott   Britpop!       270.3 pts
  3. Alan Bennett       Britpop!       210.9 pts

RG65 Winter 2023/4

  1. Alan Bennett        Ivy          300    pts
  2. John Brierley       Uno        283.9 pts
  3. Bill Culshaw         Ivy         230.7  pts

DF65 Winter 2023/4

  1. Clive Warren      101     pts
  2. Jon Whitehead  100    pts
  3. Tony Sedgwick   50.5 pts

DF95 Winter 2023/4

  1. John Brierley    282.8  pts
  2. Peter Baldwin   282     pts
  3. Martin Roberts 265.5 pts

Vane 36 Nationals – Additional Photos

A few additional photos taken by Peter Stollery and a short video taken by Clive Warren of a downwind start between Sam and Peter Whiteside have been added to the Album for the recent MYA Vane 36 Nationals 2024 at Birkenhead.  See:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/156223785@N07/sets/72177720315938567

They include this great one of Zak Roberts catching the fast and slippery boat of Chris Harris at the end of a fast 3 sail run down the length of Birkenhead Lake.