A warm sunny day, reasonably consistent wind and a colourful lake. What more could we want? Answer – More Sailors: possibly due to confusion with the DF95 open being postponed many thinking the lake unsailable combined with holidays and a few being unavoidably detained on other things.
The three that were up for it had a very enjoyable time, eight races were held. Although the algae was present the boat speed was little affected. The usual course was sailed using the whole lake. Starts were consistently good with very close racing throughout the course with each achieving at least one win.
- Dave Williams 6pts 6 wins
- Richard Walker 12pts 1 win
- David White 13pts 1 win
There were just 8 brave souls who participated in the DF65 racing this morning. One additional sailor turned up and after a quick practice decided he would return home and get on with other things.
There was a light A+ breeze straight down the lake, but unfortunately it was a tough morning and your result was usually based on how you managed the build up of algae on the keel and rudder. The favoured way was to keep to the near bank and “dunk” your boat several times upwind and down to shed the algae. Deciding how often and where to “dunk” could determine the outcome as you needed to catch the shifts right, otherwise you might lose out to someone else who did get it right (by good planning or a bit of luck).
Paul and Peter were vying for top spot with Paul just gaining the most wins, although the last race was very tight and only a boat length separated them at the finish, with a sychronised tack off the bank 2m out from the finish. Unfortunately, Peter hadn’t capitalised on Paul’s RO duty earlier on when Neil took the win, but the overall result would still have gone to Paul who won the last race.
Although it was frustrating at times (Malcolm couldn’t stand the pressure and ended up a spectator after two races), racing was still close and the result could quite easily have gone a different way.
Post racing we celebrateda big “0” birthday for Clive with a Birthday cake very kindly provided by Clives’ sister Gill. Thanks go to Dave W and Peter for the photos and Paul for producing the results.
Before racing started we did take the time to embarrass Clive by singing happy birthday to him as well as enjoying some birthday cake that his sister, Gill, had brought over to celebrate with. He had also been busy on his birthday adding some wider”feet” to the clubhouse benches, so hopefully they will not topple over as easily.
As for the racing, with the wind virtually straight down the lake the usual windward mark, spreader and leeward gate was used. Normally with only a small fleet we would have self marshalled the start with first boat to finish scoring. However, as Gill had stayed the watch the racing she was quickly enrolled as PRO for the afternoon.
With only four boats the racing was very relaxed. In the first two races Phyl definitely had good boat speed off the line and was tough to catch. In race one Paul was slow in comparison, but after some tweaking to his new A rig, he did get his boat going well in the following races. Neil had some good starts and was in the mix throughout the afternoon, as was Clive who got the better of Paul going into the leeward mark holding on to the finish in race three. In the end, Paul counting three 1sts and a 2nd came out on top. With Clive and Neil tied on points, Neil took 2nd overall based on their results in the last race.
Nine competitors for the DF95 afternoon race. The light wind from just about over the houses at the top end of the lake. It was also warm, so what could go wrong? Unfortunately, the algae seemed to like the fins on the 95’s which caused extreme frustration. Joining us from The Great Orme club was Mathew Pritchard, with this his first competitive race.
Racing started on time with the usual course starting at the Clubhouse end, windward and spreader mark to starboard down through the gate and finish halfway up the lake. The first race saw the only call over of the day with Guy just pushing it to extreme, lesson learned. This race saw Ian taking a commanding lead to the first mark with John Br. catching him on the run to the gate but then losing it over the final lap. It was decided to go to one lap after a long 25 min race.
With the boats moving slowly in the light wind, allowing the algae to coat the fin and lead keel. This caused great frustration so we lost two sailors early on. The next race saw a new leader with Dave taking honours from Mr consistent John Brierley ( he managed 4 seconds) before also retiring. Race three saw Ian take another win with Alan and Dave fighting for third. Race 4 saw Alan take the win. Race 5 saw John Beech. come in to his own taking an easy win.
At the break the constant uncertainty of the algae situation saw us lose another two sailors. Mathew was given a little tuning advice during this time which he promptly put to good use on the next five races. Guy refreshed after the break took the next race from Mathew with one of the closest finishes of the day.
The next race saw Alan’s rudder servo burn out and then we were down to 4. We decided to carry on to complete 10 races which suited Mathew taking three firsts. John unfortunately seem to struggle with the algae problems even though the wind had now picked up. Overall Mathew took the event by one point from Dave. Thanks go to Dave for acting RO and for the few photos.
A great start to the sailing day with a crisp N. Westerly blowing straight down the lake. Despite the sun the wind felt distinctly chilly sending a few skippers back for some extra layers. There was a bit of chop at the leeward end of the lake but the wind action seemed to have reduced the algae, and no boats appeared to suffer any effects from this during the morning’s racing.
The usual course format was agreed with two of the rather random selection of leeward end marks providing an almost perfect start line. As there were only eight skippers a single leeward mark was agreed to save resetting the gate and this worked OK.
Mike got away quickly with three wins in a row, but then John – who had suffered a coming together in race three – made a couple of tweaks and was immediately much faster winning four of the last five races. There were some significant shifts to play with, and then a tricky area approaching the top mark resulting in a few games of musical chairs in some of the races which materially altered the rounding positions.
The breeze stayed in at top end of B rig levels giving some great sailing and the odd downwind nose dive. There was also quite a bit of inadvertent minor contact and a couple of entanglements due to the rather gusty conditions but no damage. Alan missed race seven after discovering a leak in the battery hatch cover and Charles and Andrew missed some of the races for other reasons.
