Page 36 - Masthead - Salcombe Yacht Club 2019 Yearbook

34 Salcombe Gin SYC Regatta 2018
SALCOMBE GIN YACHT CLUB REGATTA 2018
The 2018 Salcombe Gin SYC Regatta was a great success and offered challenges to the many competitors for six days with both light and very heavy winds sailing conditions. The racing was divided into morning and afternoon starts thereby ensuring that for the week’s racing all the different tidal conditions were experienced by everyone.
The sun was out with the wind mainly from the west and with the estuary full of visiting yachts, ribs, inflatables and paddle boards, sailing was particularly challenging and exciting in the spectator zone off the Club House and start line.
There were plenty of visitors in the ten, daily class starts and this year saw a
very healthy Junior fleet and a welcome resurgence in the RS400, Lark, Enterprise and Laser Standard classes. For the morning starts Race Officer John Wylie was faced with some very light wind days with the westerly wind direction over the club sometimes resulting in tricky calls in terms of the best direction of travel.
The Junior handicap was won by Ben Meek in his RS Tera, however, he did have strong competition from two visitors in Oliver Randall-May sailing a Laser 4.7 from Chichester SC and Ollie Meadowcroft from Upper Thames SC in an Aero5. The Junior Topper class was an SYC lock out with Thomas Lawson taking the overall win.
The eighteen boat fast handicap was competitively contested with Alistair Morley
showing his well known all weather sailing ability winning overall in one of the four Phantoms in the fleet. Fran Gifford and Sophie Mackley were second in a Merlin Rocket followed by Dan Bridger in his Aero9. The nine RS400 earnt the right to have their own start and enjoyed close racing with visitors Steve Restall and Chris Stubbs from Downs SC emerging victor from ex 505 world champion and resident of Salcombe, Peter Colclough crewed by a combination of his wife Sue and Pete Bennett. The Laser Radial fleet had ten boats and Andrew Groves pipped Esther Mclarty to the overall win. The all visitor Enterprise fleet was won by Jane and Nick Scutt from Martin Brooking and Jane Anderson.
For the Regatta, the Salcombe Yawl fleet divide into three starts the Gold, Blue and elite Red fleet and a very popular winner
of the Gold fleet this year was Jayne and Richard Morris who won all but one of the trophy races, however by winning a trophy, according to class rules they must in the future sail in the Blue fleet or Red fleet. The
Blue fleet consists of mainly pre-number 141 Yawls and this year Yawl 97 sailed by Andrew Wood and Tim Petit proved to be worthy winners from Mike Knowles and Mark Waterhouse in Yawl 15. Throughout the season Andrew Wood has been training the Junior Fleet in terms of racing skills and it was rewarding to see his fine result and endeavour both in the Yawl and Junior fleet too.
The afternoon Race officer Geoff Gilson expertly set racing both in the creeks when possible and in the estuary, for example, on the Thursday when there were extreme 34 Knot gusts.
The Red fleet enjoyed very competitive sailing with Simon Gibbons and Andrew Read winning the first light wind Sunday race by an impressive margin in Yawl 167. However, as the week progressed Paul Ellis and Martin Beck in Yawl 181, and Will and Mandy Henderson in Yawl 183 entered the leading pack with the Henderson’s winning overall and also securing the magnificent Auburn Cup in a 30 Knot very windy Friday race. The Thursday afternoon racing
was even more extreme with one broken wooden Yawl mast and one capsize which involved getting the Yawl to the shore and then bailing out for half an hour.
In addition to the Red and Blue fleet starts, the afternoon racing included the National Twelves, Solos and Laser
...RACING WAS EVEN MORE EXTREME WITH ONE BROKEN WOODEN YAWL MAST AND ONE CAPSIZE