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Category: news

DF65TT Round 10 Day 1

The day started with little or no wind, but a light breeze picked up after RO John Brierley had given his briefing and so Race 1 got underway soon after 10:00.  However, the breeze dropped during the race and the fleet was well spread by the time the leaders finished and the RO called a temporary halt and we restarted after about an hour when the breeze had picked up to a nice WNW breeze of about 5 knots.  We managed 5 races before taking lunch, with John Tushingham taking three wins, plus John Carlin and Peter Baldwin one each.  After lunch, a total of 11 further races were completed (with one break) before the cut-off time of 17:30. In this session there were five different race winners.  Peter took the lions share of seven race wins, with Dave Burke, Alan Watkinson, Simon Fairman and John Tushingham with one each.  Special mention to newcomer to the sport, Tony Sedgwick, who was unlucky to lose out in one race ending up second to Peter on the final leg into the finish having led for a good part of the race.

Racing on Saturday (c) Dave Williams

Results at the end of day 1 are as follows:

 

Calendar and new events posted

I have now put up the Calendar for the Winter and added events through until the end of March.  Only 12 events will show in the “Upcoming Events” list at any one time.

The events include the upcoming DF65 TT on the weekend of 21st & 22nd October and the Strebor IOM Open to be held on Saturday 16th December.  This will be Round 2 of the Northern District IOM Winter Series, following on from Round 1 at Askern on the 4th November .

Peter Baldwin

Sailing Sec

DF95 Summer Series 2023 #4 – 7/10/23

An un-seasonally warm and bright day greeted the 10 skippers who attended for the fourth round of the DF-95 Summer Series at Gautby Road. The wind(?) was very light and coming from the west over the houses giving conditions that were more suited to “a glass of Pimms on the terrace” than sailing, but our skippers decided to go for it with “A” rigs.

From the onset the conditions were very challenging with the almost none existent wind swirling, gusting(?) then dropping and full of holes but all the boats made the best of them that they could.

Given that the wind could gust and be gone faster than you could say the words there were few recalls at the starts which was at the Clubhouse end of the lake with the course going up to the top end of the lake and back over two laps with a finish half way up the lake.

John Brierley made the most of the conditions seeming to catch a wind that was not available to the boats alongside and often being half a lap ahead of the trailing fleet which gave him 5 wins and 2 seconds. Although John was a convincing winner on the day he did not have it all his own way with Alan Watkinson (1), Clive Warren (2) and John Carlin (1) winning races.

A break was welcomed by all the skippers after 5 races after which racing continued for a further 4 races before everyone agreed that conditions were just too flat to continue.

Paul Little came along to watch the racing and offered to be RO for the day which was greatly appreciated by all the skippers.

DF65 & DF95 Social Racing 2023 – 27/9/23

12 sailors braved the threat of storm Agnes to be greeted by a very gentle breeze blowing down the lake. By the time general greetings and pleasantries had been exchanged the wind had filled in from the Southeast and the general opinion was a B rig would be the sensible choice. A standard course using the full lake was set with the first leg towards the clubhouse end followed with a short spreader leg then down to the gate, and then a beat to the finish.

The B Rig was the perfect choice and sailing got underway on time, The wind was reasonably steady but with enough shifts to make it interesting and meant the skippers had to keep their wits about them. The sailing was extremely close and competitive throughout the fleet with 9 of the 12 helms finishing in the top 3 in at least 1 race. The rain arrived after race 5 and got heavy enough at the end of race 8 to call a halt for lunch.

The day turned out to be far better than any of the weather forecasts had predicted and was very enjoyable for those who chanced their arm.

Final positions are shown below but the top honours went to John Carlin (4 wins), James Douglas (3 wins,) and new member Tony Sedgewick (1 win). A special mention to Frans King who had his most competitive days racing to date

Finally a special thanks to Neil Westbrook who volunteered to be the Race Officer for the day

  1. John Carlin              8
  2.   James Douglas    14
  3.  Tony Sedgewick  21 (1 win)
  4.  Alan Watkinson   21
  5.  Clive Warren         22
  6.  Dave Williams      25
  7.  Frans King              29
  8.  Andrew Potter       36
  9.  Richard Walker     39
  10. John Beech           53
  11. Dave Howard       54 (1 x 5)
  12. Malcolm Harvey  54

Over lunch the rain stopped and the wind freshened slightly from the morning session to welcome the 4 die hard DF95 sailors, (John C, Frans, Malcolm and Clive). Informal racing took place over about 90 mins, no results were recorded but a great time was had by all four in one of the best winds we have seen in quite a while at Gautby Road.

DF65 Social Racing 2023 – 20/3/23

Eight skippers came along to sail on a lake with a light breeze and reduced algae levels after the recent rain.  The decision was to go with an A+ set up and everyone rigged up their boats and this is where the day set its course when David Howard realised that tensioning his back stay had caused the jib crane to split his mast and he had no replacement.

It was intended to race a course set over the familiar pattern with the wind from the club house, however before the start of the first race it had switched to blowing down the lake towards the club house and back again.  The first race demonstrated how difficult the day would be with the light wind switching, gusting and disappearing as is swirled around the lake.  The course was revised to have the start at the club house end and the finish half way up the lake from race 2 onwards.

As the races progressed, frustration with the conditions seemed to be the main feeling of all the skippers and Malcolm called it a day after race 3 with sail winch creep.  Only 8 races were completed with Alan Wilkinson winning overall having 4 wins and 2 seconds and Dave Williams was second with 1 win and 4 seconds.  Other winners on the day were Richard Walker, Clive Warren and John Carlin who managed to win race 7 after struggling in the first 6 races.