A lovely day at Gautby road for the first DF65 social racing day of 2025 – blue sky and sun but alas almost no wind – and an excellent turnout of twelve racers. All the ice from last week had disappeared leaving a large armchair in the lake just below the start area.

Armchair? Why was it there we might ask…..armchair ice curling practice? / it seemed a good idea at the time? / why?  – answers on a postcard please.

Having decided not to sail all the races John Carlin very kindly went paddling and retrieved it, assisted by Paul Little (who very sensibly stayed on the bank to supervise) but John reported that there is more debris in that area which will need to be removed as soon as practicable.

Back to the sailing which looked unlikely when we all arrived as there was hardly a breath of wind. A very, very light S.Easterly breeze did come in, but all of the mornings sailing was a real dead slow and stop drifting match.

Dave set a short course using the start line which was good for the wind direction, the finish buoy as a windward mark, the outer start mark as a leeward mark and then back to the usual finish line. Races were taking more than 15 minutes on this course giving an indication of just how light conditions were.

Having said all this the racing was really very good with four different winners for the four races completed, with the first three boats covered by one point as shown below. Neil sailed very well having missed the first race and his 1,2,2 results were good enough to win from Paul P who in turn beat Mikedsp on countback.

After four races the general consensus was that enough was enough, and a finish was called. Thanks to Dave for ROing (and being chief photographer) and, as always, for doing the results, and finally thanks again to John and Paul L for removing the lake debris.

1. Neil Westbrook                5 pts       1 win
2. Paul Plested                      6 pts       1 win   (ahead on countback)
3. Mike de St Paer               6 pts        1 win
4. Clive Warren                  10 pts        1 win
5. Charles Legg                  14 pts
6. Alan Watkinson            16 pts
7. Richard Walker             16  pts                   (ahead on countback)
8. Frans King                     21 pts
9. David White                  23 pts
10. Malcolm Harvey         30 pts                  (ahead on countback)
11. John Carlin                    30 pts                  (rtd after R1)
12. Paul Little                      39 pts

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

Southerly breeze today – more or less as forecasted – from the clubhouse corner, which slowly filled in after looking very unpromising as DF65 racers were arriving. Although forecast to build significantly during the morning, this never quite happened and the breeze varied up and down quite a bit with some fairly significant shifts as well.

Mike dsp was quick out of the blocks to win the first three races but then slightly lost his way after a race RO duty when normal business was resumed with John B winning the next three before he had to leave to catch up with work. The next three races had three different winners with JohnC, Clive and Mike taking the last three.

Racing, and particularly the starts, was all very close, with a few OCS calls during the morning and once again, although the start looked somewhat starboard end biased, skippers were able to take different sides of the beat during the morning to get to the top mark in the leading group. The last beat up from the leeward gate also proved interesting with different gate marks paying off at different times for the beat back to the line.

Following JohnB’s departure Mike dsp was able to hold on to win, with very close racing reflected in the points across the fleet with 3^rd, 4^th and 5^th covered by 5 points (and some less than one point differences when averages for RO were used), and then 7^th to 10^th by less than 5.

Overall results as shown below with the usual thanks to Dave for getting everything going and Malcolm for working out the results (with a bit of help from AFleet!).

1. Mike de St Paer           10.3 pts  4 wins
2. John Carlin                    16 pts     1 win
3. Clive Warren                22 pts    1 win
4. John Brierley               27 pts  3 wins
5. Richard Robinson     27 pts
6. Simon Bates                37.7 pts
7. Paul Little        .            44.6  pts
8. Sally Collings              44.6 pts
9. Richard Walker          46.9 pts
10. Dave Williams            48.7 pts
11. Charles Legg               53.9 pts
12. Malcolm Harvey        64.9 pts
13. Frans King                    82   pts

DF65

A bright day greeted the 10 sailors who turned up, but with wind sadly lacking for the first couple of races.  David Williams opted to run the racing today and after setting an additional start mark racing got underway shortly after 11 with a short course used for the first two races to minimise the race duration.

James Douglas showed his light wind potential by winning Race 1, followed by Clive Warren who took Race 2.  The RO then extended the course to use the length of the lake as we now had breeze straight down the lake for most of the time, although there were a number of holes and localised gusts that could catch anyone out.  Peter Baldwin took Race 3 and then Alan Watkinson achieved the win in Race 4.  Although we had seen four different winners, it could be anyone’s race and Mike De St Paer, Paul Plested, Sally Collings and John Carlin were all in the mix with top 3 places.

In races 5 to 7, James seemed to have the engine on as he scored three straight wins, leaving the others in his wake, with his run finally spoilt by Peter taking the win in Race 8.

Helped by the four wins, James took the morning, with Peters two wins aiding his second place overall and a consistent set of results placed John Carlin third.

1. James Douglas         73  13pts (4 wins)
2. Peter Baldwin          63  15pts (2 wins)
3. John Carlin                11  18pts
4. Paul Plested           154  21pts
5. Clive Warren           53  22pts (1 win)
6. Sally Collings        829  27pts
7. Alan Watkinson   373  34pts (1 win)
8. Mike De St Paer      35  38pts
9. Frans King                95  45 pts
10. Malcolm Harvey 1019  53pts

DF95

With a cold NE/NNE breeze today it seemed a few sailors may have opted to stay in the warm and not venture out, leaving us with just 11 sailors.  At least the sun was out and there was a reasonable (could not call it decent) breeze which did blow down the lake at times and the sun was out.  We started on time after Peter had moved the gate into the corner and shifted the start line.

Paul Plested started the day well with a win in Race 1, Peter then took Race 2 and John Brierley Race 3.  These three then won the next three races (but not in the same order), with the front of the fleet very close and picking when to tack onto port was the key to getting a good result.  False shifts could often see you going back the way you came if you timed it wrong or worse still ending up in irons!

There was a new winner in Race 7 with Dave Williams’ boat taking the win with guest skipper Robbie Mac on the helm.  Peter took Race 8 before Paul had his third win in the final Race 9.

A morning of close racing but not (as one skipper mentioned) really champagne sailing even though the sun was out.  Paul took the morning with a very consistent set of results and a decent number of wins.  John was second, four points adrift and Peter third after a rather inconsistent morning.  There was some very close racing though with John Carlin, Mike De St Paer, Clive Warren and James Douglas also vying for the podium in some races, very often leading to close finishes.

Thanks to Dave W for running more than his fair share of the racing and working out the final scores along with Paul P and Dave for the photos.

1. Paul Plested      154  10pts
2. John Brierley      84  14pts
3. Peter Baldwin     63  16pts
4. John Carlin           11   27pts
5. Clive Warren        53  37pts
6. Dave Williams     33  41pts
7. Mike De St Paer  35  42pts
8. James DSouglas  73  44pts
9. Richard Walker   39  44pts
10. Frans King             95  46pts
11. Charles Legg         21  58pts