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Author: Peter Baldwin

Good showing by Club at Fleetwood Twixmas IOM Event

Seven club members travelled to Fleetwood for the annual Twixmas Regatta on Sunday 29th January.  It was a great days sailing with everyone in B rigs for the whole day with the wind very nearly straight down the lake.  The forecast of an increasing wind never materialising during the racing period so no rig changes were needed.

All seven club sailors finished in the top ten (just) with Brad Gibson narrowly winning the event from Rob Walsh of Fleetwood.  Chris Harris (Windrush) was third and then Graham Elliott and Martin Roberts took fourth and fifth places.  The day proved to be difficult to be consistent for some and after the top 5, the next seven places were separated by only ten points.  Fleetwood at its best and a great but challenging days sailing.  Always worth travelling to if you can at this time of the year.

Club Facebook Page

The Club has now started a Facebook page to promote the clubs activities to a wider audience.  You can now follow via “Birkenhead Radio Sailing Club”.

Birkenhead FB page

The pages will not allow all members to post an article.  That responsibility will reside in the admins who are Paul Plested, Peter Baldwin and Brad Gibson.  You will however be able to share posts, make comments and follow the club.

If you have anything that you think should be posted, please send it through to one of the admins.

Seasons Greetings

The Commodore and the Club Commitee would like to wish all our members and sailing friends a very Merry Christmas and a Happy and Healthy New Year.

We thank you for your support and participation over the past year and look forward to seeing existing and new friends at Birkenhead in 2025.

DF95 Winter 2024 #2 – 21/12/24

This last day of sailing in 2024 at the club, proved to be one to blow the cobwebs away.  As we arrived, the tail end of a squall gave heavy rain and strong gusts such that a C rig looked to be on the cards, but soon after the wind abated and we started on B rigs after Peter had tweaked the marks a little to align with the Westerly breeze.  It was nearly straight down the lake but had some strong gusts from over the houses.  Big shifts and the potential for stalling the boat was very likely at any point during the afternoon and so the key task was to keep it moving at all times.

In the first session of six races before the break we had five different winners, in the form of Peter Baldwin, Paul Plested, John Brierley, Martin Roberts and visitor Paul Middleton, with only John racking up two wins.  The wind abated at one point such that we really needed A rigs as we bobbed up and down waiting for the next gust.  However, this was very short lived and by the start of the next race B rig was the right one to be using once more.

After the break, conditions were very similar for around three races, until the gusts started to increase in strength.  The forecasts were suggesting at least double in the gusts and that looked to be the case with plenty of nose-diving and occasional loss of control.  That is until the last race when the average picked up a notch during the race and we were into survival mode for the remainder, leading to some lost places for those who couldn’t tack away from the far bank.  This session belonged to John as he notched up 4 wins, with Martin and Peter taking the other two.  This gave John an easy win on 14 points with Martin second on 21 and Peter third on 25.

Thanks go to Neil for running the afternoon and to Dave for helping him out and scoring the day after some electrical problems during the afternoon led to few race finishes for him.  Photos from Dave Williams and Paul Plested.

  1. John Brierley              84  14pts
  2. Martin Roberts         184  21pts
  3. Peter Baldwin           172  25pts
  4. Paul Middleton          06  34pts
  5. Paul Plested               154  48pts
  6. John Carlin                  50  55pts
  7. Alan Watkinson        23   58pts
(c) Paul Plested

 

DF65 Social Racing 2024 – 18/12/24

A really interesting day for the 65s with very varied conditions and some close racing. Those getting on the water early with C rigs decided fairly quickly that B rigs would be a better compromise, so before the start everyone went to B, but as usual no one had told the weather.

Dave went wading to sort out the course, with a beat the full length of the lake. The wind was North West approximately but perhaps a bit biased to the top left hand corner giving a slightly port tack biased beat. The starts were very competitive right from the first race with one or two OCS calls during the morning, but fairly soon the wind – forecast to moderate slightly – increased to the point where it was tricky to sail with B rig. Those who weren’t enjoying the conditions then changed to C rig, but others stayed with B. Clive stayed with the C for the rest of the racing to get some time on the water with the C rig, but the boat proved underpowered as the wind eased.

As soon as everyone rejoined the wind (of course) did slowly start to moderate, although still with some hefty gusts, but also with a number of flat spots which were difficult to see and left everyone somewhat underpowered.

Excellent racing with John B unquestionably the class of the field ending with seven wins, and discarding just a second and third. Other race winners were Mike with a couple of wins, and Frans with a win and some other good results particularly while the breeze was really up.

Final results as shown below, with thanks to Dave as always for sorting the course and the results. Thanks also to Sally who very kindly stayed to start a few races although she had to leave a bit early, and Alan who then took over as starter.

IOM Xmas Open 2024 – 14/12/24

It was good (and unusual!) to arrive at the club with a WNW breeze already blowing straight down the lake even at 8:00, with a forecast that it would remain that way and potentially increase during the day.  Race Officer Dave Williams (assisted by Clive Warren, Neil Westbrook, Judith Baldwin and yong Scarlett) set out a course and got the briefing underway promptly at 10:00 for the 19 sailors who attended.

Racing then started on time at 10:15 and a sequence of 4 races, break 4 races, break, which continued all day to achieve a total of 16 races, before the 15:00 final cutoff time.  We even had two sailors who travelled the furthest all the way from Glasgow; great to see such dedication.

The wind was pretty well to forecast with some meaty gusts after lunch causing occasional loss of control downwind, but it was all very short lived and everyone stayed in A rig for the whole day.

Over the day, we had six different race winners; Brad Gibson had the lions share of 8 wins, with Graham Elliott, Martin Roberts and Darin Ballington all getting two wins each, then Peter Baldwin and Simon Fairman each gaining a single win.  Next we had second and third podium places from none race winners John Brierley, Derek Priestley and Pete Walters.  Best placed without a podium place and most consistent over the whole day was Rob Macintosh.  There were some good performances at some point during the day for a good part of the fleet, but unfortunately most were often unable to capitalise on their initial position to gain a podium spot.

Overall, a great and very competitive days sailing with very little rain and a bit of sun earlier in the day.  The overall win easily went to Brad Gibson on 18 points, 21 ahead of Graham Elliott in second with Martin Roberts just 3 points adrift in third.

At the prizegiving, Brad thanked Dave and his race team helpers for running the event and achieving 16 races in a short day and for the ladies in the galley keeping us all going with hot drinks, cakes and biscuits.  Photos courtesy of Dave Williams and Clive Warren.  These photos and a few more are available on our Flikr account here.

IOM Racing continues at the club with the second Winter Series event on Saturday 11th January – See the Upcoming Events links and visitors are always welcome for this open series.