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DF65 & DF95 Social Racing 2025 – 29/1/25

DF65’s

A crisp sunny day for the DF65s today with – at last – a nice A+ breeze blowing straight down the lake from the far end to welcome the excellent turnout of 15 skippers.

Commodore Dave got the racing away promptly using the usual windward / leeward course with top spreader and leeward gate, with RO duties then shared for the days racing.

Although somewhat short for the fleet size the start line seemed to work very well, with good starts possible from various positions along the line. There was the usual preference for the starboard end which looked as if it might be favoured, but positions up the first beat suggested otherwise.

John Brierley was very clearly class of the field with five wins over the mornings ten races. He did have to work hard on one or two occasions to climb up out of the pack but consistently good sailing and a slight speed edge proved decisive.

Behind John, racing was very keen, with some really excellent starts which looked like an open and with only the odd OCS. John Carlin was clearly the best of the rest with three wins and a string of consistently good results, and was followed by Mikedsp with no wins, some reasonable steady sailing, one OCS and a number of close encounters of the DF kind.

Clive and Alan were also race winners, Paul was unlucky to have a rig failure after a good string of results, Dave beat Charles on countback, and it was great to see Dave White and Phyl Fanning starting to get into the mix.

The standard of racing overall was very good, with almost everyone having at least one good result. The top end of the beat proved particularly tricky with some quick shifts and also some bends which were not consistent and tricky to spot resulting in some crowded top mark roundings and a fair bit of inadvertent minor contact.

All in all an excellent days racing with thanks as always to Dave Williams and Malcolm for the results which are shown below and thanks to Dave for the photos.

  1. John Brierley                  11 pts        5 wins
  2. John Carlin                     20 pts        3 wins
  3. Mike de St Paer            26.5 pts
  4. Clive Warren                 33 pts          1 win
  5. Alan Watkinson           39.6 pts
  6. Neil Westbrook            41.8 pts       1 win
  7. Paul Little                      44 pts
  8. Dave Williams              46.2 pts     (ahead on countback)
  9. Charles Legg                 46.2pts
  10. Frans King                     53 pts
  11. Sally Collings                60.5 pts
  12. Don McKinnon             64.9 pts
  13. Dave White                     80 pts
  14. Malcolm Harvey         101 pts
  15. Phyl Fanning               103 pts

DF95’s

The morning conditions continued for the afternoon session. With the wind coming from the North / North east there was plenty of holes to drop into and plenty of shifts to make gains. Five skippers took to the water after a slightly delayed start whilst John and Clive helped our new member Steve Miller set his new 95 up.
Steve decided just to get some sailing practice and didn’t join in with the racing, leaving just 4 to participate. The same course as the morning used the full length of the lake with a standard windward mark, spreader and through the gate to the finish. Being a small fleet we self monitored the start and the first to finish recorded the results.
Despite the small turn out the racing was very competitive at the front of the fleet, with the lead changing hands in every race and more often than not the first 3 boats would be covered by less than 10sec at the finish. Five races were completed before the sun started to dip behind the houses, the temperature dropped and the competitors called it a day.
  1. Alan Watkinson     9pts      2 wins
  2. John Carlin             10pts      2 wins
  3. Clive Warren          11pts       1 win
  4. Phyl Fanning
In summary
Good afternoons sailing with some extremely close racing, fun time.
DO NOTE:  To all DF65 and DF95 sailors, please remember that as next Wednesday is the first Wednesday in the month, it sees the first trial day of the 95’s starting in the morning @ 11:00 with the DF65’s starting at 13:30.  This will revert back to 65’s in the morning for the remainder of the month.  To be repeated each month for now as a trial.