Good morning Everyone,

A real surprise greeted us at Dobroyd for our monthly Handicap race day.  The sun was shining; a nice constant easterly breeze had installed itself, and there was a bit of a wind wave as well to make the downwind runs interesting.  Gusts to 17 knots meant that we all ended up on C sails.  Some started on B ‘s but as the breeze kicked up a bit, we all made the change.  Still a bit of a chill in the air though.

The course was parallel to the deck, and straight out in front, so almost ideal conditions.

There was a low tide, so that meant we had to stay out of the shallows near the deck – there were a couple of boats that grounded out close in.

Fifteen sailors hit the water for some interesting racing.

The back markers didn’t really get a look in in the results; and it was good to see different names at the top of the result sheet.

Rob Lowndes took advantage of his handicap, and hooked three 1^st places; but then the 1sts were spread through the fleet.  When we look at the minor places, they were similarly shared around.

The day was notable because of the many close finishes once the race winners had cleared the line – sometimes with 4 or 5 boats approaching the line at once.

Geoff Lucas made a good recovery after having some gear problems to finish high up the list.  Karen Paterson was not so lucky, and had a gear failure causing her to drop out for the last races; but she stepped in and scored the results for those races – Thanks Karen.

So, Rob Lowndes in 1^st place on the day with 21 points;
Martin Thearle 2^nd on 28 points and
Philip Hetherington 3^rd in a count back on 31 points from Bruce Paterson, Geoff Lucas and Noel McPherson

Another day of smiles.

Our next sail will be Thursday 10 October, and will be Scratch racing.

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