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Author: Peter Baldwin

Club Members in action at the DF95 Nationals 2022

The DF95 Nationals were held at Two Islands RSC (Milton Keynes) over the last weekend (30th/31st July).  Club members John Brierley, David Potter and Peter Baldwin were representing the club in what proved to be a rather trying weekend of sailing with floating weed making an unusual appearance at this lake during the Summer, perhaps as a consequence of extended period with no rain and low water levels.  The club did what they could to try and mitigate the problem (which seemed to get worse during the days sailing) and allow the event to continue. We had a couple of people standing in the water for a good part of each day ready to lift out a boat and remove any weed before sending it on its way.

Starting with 4 heats and ending with 3, only 9 races were completed. A heavy rain shower mid afternoon on Sunday killed the wind and a resultant wind shift left insufficient time to completely rearrange the course and ensure that we could get a further race completed. Full results are available on the home page of the DFRacing website https://dfracinguk.com/ but the key results from the club’s perspective were Peter in 2nd and David Potter in 11th.

The next DF TT that members may be interested in entering is at Fleetwood on the 24th (DF65) and 25th (DF95) September.  For those with a DF95, Fleetwood have an Open on Bank Holiday Sunday, with 3 members already entered.

Open Sailing Afternoon #6 (30/7/22)

Because many members were away sailing at other events this weekend, it was great to have such an interesting mix of boats turn out for another Saturday Open Sailing Day.

Our Dutch guest Daan M  akkink and his wife arrived with a beautifully restored vintage 10 Rater, expertly converted to RC, and enjoying it’s first UK sail. Daan has obviously dedicated some serious hours in it’s restoration, and he spent a lot of time putting it through its paces on our lake. It was great to see his enjoyment and also ours in acknowledging his efforts. ( see Pics)

Neil, Alan, Paul, Charles and Andrew arrived with an extensive selection of radio yachts, ranging from RG65, DF65, DF 95 and IOM’s, with Paul Hounslow’s Manta IOM and Andrew’s John Gale built Triple Crown sailing well.  At any one time,it was possible to see all of these boats sailing in a fleet, and simply enjoying the fun of Radio Sailing.

However – the ‘ Icing on the cake’ to a great day of Radio sailing was when Graham Birkett arrived with his ‘Starkers’ Marblehead, and showed us all what amazing boats these are, in terms of speed and agility.

Social Sailing at it’s best, and lets hope we get more interest in these Open Days, when many classes of boats are present, and we have the time to compare, assist and advise and have great fun !

Andrew Peter

DF95 Social Racing practice afternoon (27/7/22)

Five Skippers put their boats on the water to have some sprint racing of a single lap and allow comparison of rig and sail settings and see what worked and what didn’t. Dave Williams very graciously agreed to loan his fin and keel to someone who forgot theirs and his reward was then to run the racing for everyone.  A big thank you to Dave for doing this.

There were some interesting results and differences in boat speed, although this was at times difficult to judge with the wind being very patchy.  By the end of the session comprising 8 races, the boats were more evenly matched  and some sailors have some future work to do, to re-rig or even obtain replacement sails before the next session.

Peter took the lions share of 6 wins for first, with Neil picking up the other two (in a borrowed boat) for second and Alan finishing with a strong cluster of podium places to edge Andrew out of third place.

An Album of photos taken by John Beech are available in the Gallery here

  1. Peter           172      6pts
  2. Neil              179     10pts
  3. Alan               04    17pts
  4. Andrew      288    19pts
  5. Richard         52   24pts

DF65 Social Racing #30 (27/7/22)

The forecasts were about right for wind today – generally from the NW but with some big swings to the W or even N and averaging about 3 knots so A+ was the order of the day for the eight sailors.  As the gusts (6 knots max!) came through there was often a false shift as it hit and if you tacked on that it often resulted in lost distance or even places.  Neil took the first race, followed by Peter in the second and John C the third. Peter took the next three and the final race, with John C having another win in Race 7.

With eight sailors each taking a turn we completed eight races of one lap plus a beat to the finish in just under two hours.  With the strength of the wind and the planned DF95 session to follow, the last race was also a single lapper.  There were no general recalls but that was in part due to the light winds we often had at the start leading to many boats being a good boat length behind the line.  Peter Baldwin took the day, with John Carlin second and Neil Westbrook third.

  1. Peter Baldwin            63       7pts  (5 wins)
  2. John Carlin                  11       12pts (2 wins)
  3. Neil Westbrook         03      16pts (1 win)
  4. Andrew Peter             19      20pts
  5. Alan Watkinson      373      22pts
  6. Richard Walker         39      27pts
  7. Charles Legg              21       36pts
  8. John Beech                 80       40pts

IOM Summer 2022 #6 (23/7/22)

This week we had 10 sailors for IOM racing including our American visitor Chuck Millican and also anew to Birkenhead visitor from Etherow – Alan Bennett.  There was a good top suit breeze from the Clubhouse end which had some decent shifts (and short flicks) which tested the patience of most sailors.  Martin Roberts (Vanilla 2) started well, picking up wins in 4 of the first 6 races before the break for a late lunch, with Peter Baldwin (Britpop!) taking the other 2.  There was some close racing though throughout the fleet with good results from newcomer Alan Bennett (Viper), Bill Culshaw (Britpop!) and Chuck Millican (Britpop!).

After the break, Martin resumed with a win in Race 7, Chuck then picked up Race 8, Peter took Race 9, Martin Races 10 and 12 and Bill Race 11.  Alan Bennett was once again on the podium in a few races, John Berry also stepped up a gear in this second session and had two seconds in the later races (had Jack added something to his tea?)

Overall a great afternoons close racing for the whole fleet with 12 races completed.  Thanks must go to Dave Williams for running the racing and keeping us all under control and taking a few photos at the same time.  There were a number of OCS calls and general recalls leading to the RO suggesting that we wait until the go before pulling the trigger rather than at 1 second.  In addition, thanks to Jack for making the drinks once again.

Finally, it was good to say hello to Bernie at the Lake today, having not seen him for a while.  Hopefully we will see more of him on future Saturday afternoons.

  1. Martin Roberts         Vanilla 2          22    19pts (7 wins)
  2. Peter Baldwin           Britpop     !      63    22pts (3 wins)
  3. Bill Culshaw               Britpop!           21    26pts (1 win)
  4. Alan Bennett              Viper                 33    36pts
  5. Chuck Millican          Britpop!  BER 21    44pts
  6. Andrew Peter             V9                       66   60pts
  7. John Berry                  Viper                  12     62pts
  8. Alan Watkinson       Britpop!             23    68pts (1×4)
  9. Neil Westbrook        Widget               03    68pts
  10. Charles Legg              Kantun 2           25   85pts

DF65 Social Racing #29 (20/7/22)

After the last few days of intense heat, today was a complete contrast. Sweaters and coats were worn to combat the chilly B rig wind. We welcomed Chuck again to our Wednesday races with him using B rig for the first time. All the starts were very good with no recalls. Alan, reading the wind shifts, dominated the day with 5 wins. Overall the racing was very close with the final decision of which course to take through the final gate could gain you a few places or lose them. Surprisingly with no gear failures everyone completed the 10 races.

  1. Alan Watkinson       12 pts 5 wins
  2. Andrew Potter          17 pts 2 wins
  3. Neil Westbrook        19 pts 2 wins
  4. Dave Williams          23 pts
  5. Andrew Peter            24 pts 1 win
  6. Chuck Millican         27 pts
  7. Charles Legg             31 pts
  8. Richard Walker         42 pts
  9. Malcolm Harvey       52 pts
  10. John Beech                  54 pts