Channel Sailor
Active member
A good news and good experiences post. There must have been a fair few yacht and dinghy fleets out this weekend and I would guess those on the central south coast must have had excellent sailing. For myself and my crew we had a really good time. It is days like that that make it all worth while. For one race our club joined up with a couple of other clubs for an interclub race and ended up with nearly 30 yachts on the start line in Hayling Bay. In the fleet were an extremely varied mix of mainly cruisers or cruiser/racers of all ages and types. The oldest yacht I think was 1910, the smallest probably a Folkboat or Sonata, the largest probably a 38ft CC cruiser, mixed in with a J80 and a few 80s/90s vintage cruiser races. I vaguely recall there was a Foxhound 24 in there is well. We were also graced with a Swan and a Sunfast 32. The two downwind legs saw a right old mix of Symmetric, Asymmetric and white sails. The wind suited the smaller/lighter yachts but at least this meant that a lot more yachts joined in and smaller boats had their day. The bigger boats can excel on another windier day. OK so the handicap system probably could have been the subject of hours of post race dinner debate, but it wasn't because it seems like everybody accepts it limitations and has their own race with the yachts around them on the water that have similar abilities in the conditions. Afterwards there was eighty in number crew and owners/skippers afterwards for a lively post race dinner. I reckon it could not get any better for weekend local club Cruiser/Racer club racing as a sport. Sunday's racing was just as good except a smaller fleet. My message to anyone only lurking in this racing forum is get out there and join in.
My thanks to the forum for the tips on the upwind spinnaker douse, the Stretch and Blow method. It worked a treat.
My thanks to the forum for the tips on the upwind spinnaker douse, the Stretch and Blow method. It worked a treat.