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Friday 27 August 2010

Mirror Success in Europe

After a week’s racing at Sligo Yacht Club in Ireland Matthew and Benjamin are European Junior Mirror Champions !

Matthew and Ben, who are also the current North RYA Volvo Zone Champions and Scottish Mirror Champions, were surprised to claim the title, as crew Ben explains: “I don’t know how it feels [to win] really, we were quite surprised how well we did – we were probably expecting to come top three junior and tenth or fifteenth overall. Our plan was to try and get the kite set quick go the right way up he beat and get constant results really and that obviously worked!”

In the overall event there were 75 entries and they were 5th overall. They were improving all week ranking impressively well against the senior competition in the fleet. The last day was blown off due to too much wind but they won the last race sailed the day before so they may have finished even higher if racing on the last day had been held ? They were also the only non Irish boat to win a race ! Helm Matthew added: “We’re really, really pleased to win the junior title and come fifth overall. We’ve been working for this for a long time so it’s good all the works paid off training with the national squad over the winter. It was quite difficult and we had to work really hard to get the result all week. Training for a variety of conditions so we could be sure we could cope with anything that happened helped.”


RYA Mirror National Junior Squad coach Catherine Putt was bowled over their and a number of the young Zone and National Squad sailors performances, she said: “This has been a fantastic display of what great talent we have in our Junior and Zone squads. Matt and Ben did fantastically well – they have trained really hard over the winter and it’s all clicked together for them securing such a good results against some real adversities too which was great.”

This could, of course, end being quite costly for them (Well, at least for Peter and Heather !) as the next major event is the Mirror World Championships which take place just after Christmas in Albany, Australia !!!!!

Other Juniors from the Club did well also. Matthew, sailing with Ed from Beaver SC was 25th overall and Will, sailing with Oliver from Ripon SC were close behind in 26th place overall

A great series of results and well done to them all !





Photo of Ben and Matthew at the Prizegiving
with the first Junior girls Emma and Rachel from Beaver SC who were 13th overall



With thanks to Steve Wilkinson, the RYA and Yachts and Yachting.com for the quotes and photo

Thursday 26 August 2010

The End of the Wednesday Night Sailing

The Wednesday Night Race series came to quiet conclusion this week. As the sailors gathered OODs Phil and Tim were desperately looking for the wind, Paul and John tried to help by launching early, but sailing in the same direction with one running and one beating everybody knew it was going to be one of those nights. The OODs decided the most consistent wind direction, set the course and 14 boats decided to take up the challenge. Some miss judged the time it took to get from the shore to the start so the second start was busier than it should have been, meanwhile Vanessa was still looking for a bung for the Topper !


It was a pleasant drift around in the diminishing light, except for trying to get round mark nos 6 and 1 where the wind was generally weird and very light and and would catch boat and keep them stuck there for a while. Attention needed to be paid to the burgee as the wind direction would flip 180 degrees and you needed to tack the boat over without changing direction to keep the sails filling and prevent the boat stalling.

Bill, of course, managed to keep moving throughout and lead the fleet by a country mile, while Rob kept the pressure on the Lasers in front of him to be ahead of them of handicap. At one stage it looked like Bob in his Otter was going to be well up as well but he seemed to lose time towards the end. Paul from Tuesday Nights joined in the racing in a Pico and was doing well but was progressively getting slower and lower in the water until a shout came from the OOD box “Have you got your bung in ?” Ooops !



Thanks to the OODs Phil and Tim, ably assisted by Glenis and Becky





As the boats were taken off the sky was turning a fantastic pink colour – “Red Sky at Night, .... ” and all that !
What do we do on an evening now ?????

Friday 20 August 2010

National 12 'Ribbie' Sailing

he fleet of 5 Ribbed National Twelves dating from 1936 to 1953 gathered again at the Club on Sunday 15th August for the 3rd ‘Ribbie’ event of the season. The previous event 6 weeks before had to be curtailed due to fairly strong winds, one bent (metal) mast and an unwillingness to find out the extent that wooden masts can bend! This time the assembled sailors were greeted by sunshine and a light northerly breeze. Tim Gatti had worked hard getting the boats ready (four of these boats belong to him) and sorting helms and crews for the event (not helped by it being the holiday season and injuries to some of the regular teams).


Each competing team was allocated a boat for the first race and five short races of approximately 20 minutes each were to be run. After every race crews change boats and all races count for the day’s results thus each team has equal chance of success. Ken Goddard and Ann Britton from Trent Valley SC had come up for the day to experience ‘Ribbie racing’ for the first time, whereas the rest had participated in at least one of these events beforehand.

The Race Officers Neil and Rachel set a short course with a 3, 2, 1, Go! start sequence to keep things moving, however the first start was slightly delayed whilst cordial relationships were maintained with other users of the Tarn (fishermen and the Model Boat Club) and the course adjusted to suit



Howard Chadwick and Helen Nicholson sailing in N341 Mat, an Uffa King built in 1938, led off the first start and looked to have the race in the bag but John Cheetham and Gail Kaye sailing N711 Sinner, a Gnome design built in 1949, kept pushing and got inside berth at the last leeward mark and held a slender lead to the finish. On the first leg Ken and Ann sailing N1183 Tessa, a Procter Mark 2 built in 1953, managed to find a major hole in wind at the windward mark and trailed the rest in!

What should have a quick turnaround between races was somewhat extended while Tim Gatti and Vanessa Kennedy played with the steel centreplate on Sinner to get it to hang properly.

After a brief delay the now slightly damp pair rejoined the rest of the fleet and race 2 got underway. This time Philip David and Tace Morgan sailing Mat won the start but John and Gail sailing Tessa got the shifts right as they closed the windward mark to take the lead, closely followed by Howard and Helen sailing N493 Laughter, a 1945 Holt 500 design. Philip and Tace caught Howard by the windward mark the second time around and they held that order down to the leeward mark finish.

Some frantic balling was required in all boats to empty them before a quick turnaround for the third race. The practice of two starts already meant that everybody was on the start line with John and Gail getting the best start in N2 Goldcrest, a Barnt Green design built in 1936. Tim and Vanessa, sailing Tessa tried to find more wind on the other side of the tarn to the rest and for a while it looked promising but when they tacked back in they arrived mid fleet. Philip and Tace sailing Laughter chased Howard and Helen in Sinner. The remaining three had a close race all the way round with John and Gail just crossing ahead of Tim and Vanessa and Ken and Ann sailing Mat on the last tack.

A quick break was held because by this point we were running out of time to get the next two races in before normal Club racing was due to start at 2.30. Unfortunately the wind hadn’t read the script and it went light and patchy.

Ken had halyard issues, but that gave everybody else chance to do more bailing before the start of the fourth race. Tim and Vanessa sailing Goldcrest were too eager and were over the line at the start so they had to chase the rest in a dying breeze. Philip and Tace, sailing Sinner, coped with the conditions best and lead the fleet round to the finish.

With the Club fleet starting to get ready for the afternoon’s racing the turnaround for the last race had to be a quick one. Luckily for the OOD the breeze returned for the start of the last race but went again by the time the fleet got to the windward mark. Tim and Vanessa sailing Mat lead round the windward mark but then for some reason ended up spinning around as the wind did something strange to them. This allowed John and Gail sailing Laughter into the lead. Philip and Tace, in Tessa, managed to slide past the other two at the windward mark, and then glided past Tim still trying to get Mat pointing in the right direction! By the leeward mark the fleet closed up again. The beat had become a fetch but John and Gail managed to maintain their narrow lead and lead the fleet round the next two marks to finish the race which was shorten at the wing mark. This allowed the bare minimum time for Neil and Rachel to be able to finish the Twelves, and then set up the start for the Club Race a few minutes later!!!!



Big thanks to Tim for organising the event and for keeping the fleet in fine condition, to Gerard Kennedy and Ian Morgan for feeding us bacon butties and mugs of tea and to Neil and Rachel for managing to get the 5 races in just before the normal Club races were due to start.

Unfortunately the final event of the season due for October has had to be cancelled as Tim is due to start his boat building course shortly and will be spending most of his time over the coming months either in Lowestoft, or travelling between Lowestoft and Bradford, and every body wishes him the best of luck with that!



The Results

The Crews:-

1st John Cheetham and Gail Kaye 9pts

2nd Philip David and Tace Morgan 9pts

3rd Howard Chadwick and Helen Nicholson 12pts

4th Tim Gatti and Vanessa Kennedy 21pts

5th Ken Goddard and Ann Britton 24pts



And for the Boats:-

1st N711 Sinner – Gnome design

2nd N493 Laughter – Holt 500 design

3rd N1183 Tessa – Procter Mark 2 design

4th N341 Mat – Uffa King design

5th N2 Goldcrest – Barnt Green design

Thursday 19 August 2010

STOP PRESS

Mirror Europeans at Sligo Yacht Club
After 3 days of racing and 7 races completed in the Mirror European Championships at Sligo in Ireland Matthew and Benjamin Lulham Robinson are lying in 8th place overall in a competitive fleet of 73 Mirrors.
Also Will Hide sailing with Oliver Williams of Ripon are in 26th place and Matthew Foster, sailing with Ed Grayson of Beaver, are close behind in 29th place overall - Well done to them all !

For further updates see http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/