Results / Fat Face Racing Circuit Derwent - 02/06/2002

Due to an unfortunate clash with the World Cup match, only three boats made the trip to Derwent Reservoir for the Fat Face sponsored Racing Circuit event. After a series of fun races on Saturday, the real racing started on Sunday in a breeze that varied from six knots to around fifteen, with some big shifts. Jamie Mawson (Ulley SC) took an early lead and held it to the finish, taking the race from Steve Cook (Stokes Bay). Steve lead the next race at the windward mark, but was passed later in the race by Jamie with the same result as the first race. Steve got on the right side of the wind bend in race 3, to take a substantial lead only to suffer from an unfortunate capsize, which meant Jamie took a third win. Monday saw the best racing of the weekend, with some very close racing between Steve and Jamie, with rarely more than a couple of boatlengths between them. Jamie just managed to stay ahead to take the race, with Steve finishing one boatlength behind. Steve led the next race from start to finish, which made it interesting as he could still take the event if he won the rest of the races. Jamie won the last race though and secured the event with five firsts out of eight possible races. Tuesday saw the strongest winds of the event, 20 knots plus with some huge gusts. The first race was delayed by an hour as the wind could not decide what direction it was blowing from. Racing finally got underway only to be abandoned after two laps as the wind had made every leg a reach or fetch. Steve won the re-started race, with the final race abandoned due to time constraints. Bringing up the rear in each race was newcomer Mark Henman, sailing his first RS event after only sailing the boat three times. Mark sailed some good first beats but did not manage to stay with the leaders for the whole race.