Sailing Report – Whitby Gazette Cup
Autumn gales have been disrupting
the sailing recently, but the wind eased enough for 4 boats to head out to
contest the Whitby Gazette Cup – all sporting well reefed sails. Course options
were limited as some of the racing marks were lost during the storms, and the
sea remained rather rough further out so a run close in to the Sandsend inner
mark and a beat back was chosen.
The downwind leg proved tricky
going, with no-one braving a spinnaker in the conditions, the boats were all
rolling around struggling to hold their sails in the goose-wing position whilst
being pushed around by the waves. Icon gradually pulled her way to the front,
ahead of Cold Steel and Qantro with Lady Hamilton clinging on to the tail of
the faster boats.
Approaching Sandsend a problem
became clear. The inner Sandsend mark was no-where to be seen. While a
GPS-guided Icon headed for its usual location, Qantro headed further in hoping
to find it had been swept in, but to no avail. A back-up plan to go around a
virtual mark at the GPS location was devised and so the fleet headed around and
started a beat back to Whitby. With Icon still leading, Cold Steel decided to
shake out her reef to try to catch up. Now heading into the waves the helmsmen
had to work hard to keep the yachts powering forwards. Qantro found it
particularly hard going and decided that 1 lap was enough for her.
For the second lap W mark off
Upgang was used as the turning point. Icon had also now got full mainsail up
and was holding Cold Steel at bay, Lady Hamilton was now on her own in 3rd.
The order remained unchanged for the rest of the race and so Icon claimed the
cup.
Result: 1st Icon, Neil & Lorraine Williamson, 2nd
Cold Steel, Dey, Jarvis and Gowland, 3rd Lady Hamilton, Malcolm
& Joanna Stuart
No comments:
Post a Comment