Results / RS300 Inland Championships Draycote Water SC - 16/10/2010

RS300 Inlands, sponsored by Gill

Draycote Water SC

 

Well, the forecast wasn’t great, a maximum of 10 knots on the Saturday and the possibility of nothing at all on the Sunday. Despite this 20 entries were recorded for the RS300 Inlands hosted by Draycote Water SC on 16/17 October, in conjunction with the Supernova Inlands, and sponsored by Gill. Racing was delayed by half an hour on Saturday morning as we were made safe from killer shrimps which are known to hunt in packs in certain Midland reservoirs.

Come the start there was a full hiking breeze of around 12 knots from the north. Richard LeMare from the home club got away best in race 1 on a port-biased line. Slightly to windward, national champion Steve Bolland (Bristol Corinthian) was forced into a 720 despite clearly not having been given opportunity to keep clear by the boat to leeward. As if to prove that fortune favours the righteous, and while doing his turns at the first reasonable opportunity, he accidently drifted the correct side of the start line thereby nullifying his OCS of which he had been blithely unaware.

LeMare unsurprisingly led at the first mark followed by Richard Kennedy (Thorney Island) and remarkably Bolland. Bolland inched past Kennedy on the run on the trapezoid course but LeMare had opened the gap considerably downwind. Starting the second beat LeMare held a commanding, and for anyone else, what would have been a race-winning lead. As if to prove that fortune favours the righteous, the wind went 20 degrees left as Bolland (and the rest of the fleet) rounded the leeward mark leaving LeMare stranded on the right. Hysterical laughter could be heard coming from LeMare as he struggled to decide whether to stick or twist, cut his losses or wait for the wind to go back right.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. The correct thing to have done, as we all know now, would have been for LeMare to have cut his losses. Unfortunately he stuck to his guns but the wind was equally stubborn and refused to budge back and three-quarters of his lead had evaporated by the time he came across. Bolland had pulled away from the chasing pack allowing him into the same gust sequence as LeMare and the two of them pulled well clear downwind. This gave Bolland the liberty of going into full-attack mode on the final beat.

Bolland tacked immediately on rounding the leeward mark, just ‘to give Richard something to think about’. This time LeMare covered and when Bolland tacked on the port layline, LeMare tacked directly in front of him. As if to prove that fortune favours the righteous, Bolland got a lift and gust that brought him to windward and line abreast of LeMare giving him the inside berth at the mark. By this time the sobbing coming from LeMare was truly heart-rending. If the nightmares don’t stop soon I’m going to have to seek professional help.

Bolland kept ahead downwind to take a well deserved win. LeMare was 2^nd followed by Kennedy, Harry McVicar (Aldenham) and Sam Sutton-Reid (Leigh & Lowton).

After the exertions of the first race it was in for lunch – pasta and fruit for the athletes and chips for the rest of us. LeMare could be seen kicking his trolley tyres in disgust while Bolland remarked that ‘you make your own luck in this game’. Meanwhile it was decided to hold an additional race in the afternoon in case the forecast for Sunday actually proved reliable.

Race 2 was started in similar conditions except that the wind had gone round to the right, something that LeMare was no doubt asking why it had not done an hour earlier. Lemare’s luck didn’t immediately change for the better as he was squeezed out of the start, from which we can only deduce he must have done something really wicked in a previous life. With the wind oscillating but generally favouring the right, Bolland ducked a couple of transoms to protect that side of the course towards the end of the beat to lead at the first mark. He was followed by Chris Gandy (Draycote Water) also coming in from the right and Sutton-Reid.

Bolland pulled clear downwind but the positions behind remained static. Learning from LeMare’s misfortune in race 1, Bolland elected to cover closely but was thwarted in this tactic by the following boats unsportingly electing to split tacks. Bolland still led at the windward mark but Sutton-Reid had closed down on Gandy. As the race progressed Bolland pulled further clear with Sutton-Reid moving into second spot. As the breeze lightened during the latter stages of the race Gandy started to lose out elevating Kennedy, McVicar and LeMare into the remaining top spaces.

The best wind of the day came in as the fleet waited for race 3. However, it came in with another kick to the right which necessitated a change of course during which time the wind died to its previous level. As the countdown to the start of race 3 progressed, the wind nudged left again. Who would be a race officer in these conditions?

With a port-biased beat the obvious tactic was to get onto port tack quickly. Bolland was one of the first to go with LeMare a few lengths to windward. Kennedy, meanwhile, was making a lay-line approach from way out and praying that the wind wouldn’t shift. Two-thirds of the way up the beat Bolland crossed LeMare on a slight knock. When they next met LeMare was on his approach to the windward mark with Bolland tacking to leeward and hoping that LeMare had got his layline right. (He had). Meanwhile, Kennedy (lucky b*****d) was creaming in from the left but elected not to push his luck too far and ducked Bolland and LeMare to round third.

Starting the second beat with the leading positions remaining the same, Kennedy again went left. Proving that you cannot be lucky two beats in a row, unless you’re called Bolland, this time Kennedy lost out. Bolland won the tussle with LeMare for the win with Kennedy showing his consistency with another 3^rd with Sutton-Reid and McVicar also in the mix. There was a moment of levity as Barry Steel approached the finishing line. Involved in a luffing duel he missed the line and had to gybe back round the committee boat and then had a senior moment as he forgot to gybe back and sailed parallel with the line until he came back to his senses. This is what the rest of us have to look forward to in years to come.

The wind had basically had enough by the time we started race 4. The lighter wind brought several new faces to the front. McVicar sailed a canny first beat to lead ahead of Terry Brooks (Oxford), Bolland and Alastair Wood (Bough Beech). Further back a lot of banter could be heard between helms who had previously been towards the front of the fleet in the earlier races, Class Rep Sutton-Reid taking it upon himself to raise his profile by visiting all sections of the fleet.

On the second beat McVicar simply sailed way from the rest of us while Wood was also going quickly. God I hate lightweights with big rigs in these winds. McVicar sailed away to victory while Bolland just about snatched 2^nd ahead of Woods and Brooks. Chris Wright (Draycote) and Pete Ellis (Aldenham) also finished well.

After day one Bolland was leading on 3 points with three helms tied on 9 points for 2^nd place, McVicar just shading it by virtue of his bullet in the last race. Après-sail consisted of a Chinese, beer and a pub quiz. With his parents paying a visit Bolland elected to eschew the bar until they had gone as they still believe him to be teetotal. The quiz was a success and the 300 fleet showed they had the brains by easily defeating the Supernova representatives, the ones that bothered to show up anyway. The only moment of controversy came during the picture round, which involved matching boats with their designer, when it was revealed that one particularly ugly looking boat was not, in fact, a joint collaboration by Stevie Wonder and Ray Charles.

As the bar closed Bolland was last seen nursing 3 pints of Stella. As if to prove once again that fortune favours the righteous Sunday dawned beautifully sunny but thankfully, mercifully with a total absence of wind thus saving Bolland from having to drag his alcohol-ravaged body back onto the water. So, it was an early prizegiving and an early drive home for many, though a little later for some.

Once again thanks to Gill for providing prizes that were distributed through the fleet and to all those from Draycote who were involved in running a most enjoyable event, especially race officer Chris Avery and his team who coped well in difficult conditions. The Inlands are already booked in again at Draycote next year so we can once again sample their beer hospitality.