Toughest Racing of the Year

Remember the first time you ever raced a dinghy? Today eight new junior sailors joined normal Saturday racing for their first ever official taste of club racing in the OpTop Olympics which was run along with Saturday Racing. Before the start they were given a whistle stop tour of the OOD box by officer of the day, Alistair Coates. He explained all the rules so there would be no disputes whatsoever!!! Intermediate coach Robert Leigh was on the water to give advice and encouragement. From the start, all the juniors sailed over the line very quickly after the Go. Please note parents, some of them do need sailing timer watches quick sticks 🙂

To say the juniors did good in the first race would be an understatement as they seemed to lead the senior fleet on the corrected PY times. Swiftly moving on it was great sailing by all in the second race by the juniors beginners and intermediates to split the senior fleet in two. There was a long on the water discussion about the rules on the run but this was settled without protest.

Some beginners had sneaked in to the intermediate group mounting a credible challenge to the more experienced group. In the end it was hard to split them as you can see from the results. In the end it was the Edwards brothers Tom and Dougie who shared the bullets and took joint first. Rob decided using count back scoring to split them might cause a family rift. Joint third was new boy on the block Bruno Nicholas in his new racing optimist. One to watch when Dad has his rig sorted. The endeavor moment of the day was from Jack Oates who had a nose bleed on the reach and decided retiring would be the best thing. On the run back to the club house me managed to stop it bleeding then continued his racing for joint third.

On the photo are the Edwards brothers and Bruno Nicholas receiving their posh sweets. Well done to all competitors and also to the senior fleet who just managed to put up with us.