Swallow Nationals at Bembridge Sailing Club

Darter dominant

Blissful sunshine, warm seas and a force 2-3 southerly breeze on Saturday made sailing in the Solent appear like the Med. Racing took place south of St. Helen’s Fort. 15 Swallows took part.

The first of the four race Championships started from a long but port-biased line in a good southerly F3. Most of the contenders were in evidence although Archon (Malcolm Green) incurred an early penalty. Darter (Guy Knight, Tony Glover and Steve Hammett) was ahead at the first windward mark of the Olympic triangle course and also made a useful gain on the first tight spinnaker reach followed by Solitude (Anthony Lunch, Andrew Reid and Alice Glover) and Migrant (Charles Fisher and Richard and Carol Thompson). Wind blowing from the Isle of Wight made the beats in to shire very shifty – to say the least - and were difficult to judge correctly. Skua (John Walmsley) and Goosander (Nigel Pattison) took advantage to pull through to 2nd and 3rd places. Several boats suffered the fate of being amongst the leaders at the windward mark on round one before loosing places after sailing a similar course on round two. Not so for Tony Glover and his team on S88 Darter. They were invincible throughout and won all 4 races!

The second race from a much shorter line and Curlew (Chris Newnes and family) flew up the first beat and held the lead from first Darter and then Whimbrel (Peter Snell). A move seaward to optimise the offwind tidal opportunities on the second triangle gave Darter the lead which they held to the finish in the reducing breeze with Solitude displacing Curlew for 2nd. Swallow folklore has it that the boat that leads at the end of the first day of the Championship day becomes history the next - a point explored at the excellent Dinner hosted by the Class Chairman and the Commodore of Bembridge S.C.

Sunday provided more ideal sailing conditions - a solid F4 and flat water in brilliant sunshine for the windward/leeward courses preferred for the day. PRO Jonathan Peel laid a good line with a fair beat - the leading boats coming from both sides but Darter was there again and moved comfortably ahead whilst Archon, finally in gear with her new sails, and Solitude gave vain chase. Sunday’s races were windward-leeward and places changed continuously downwind as well as upwind. Wind F 4-5 made boat handling more important than shift sailing and brought different boats to the front.

In the second race of the day Darter , demonstrating an ability to extricate herself from indifferent starts with superior windward performance, again found her way to the windward mark first but with Goosander and Migrant following. Solitude and Archon both lost the plot on the beats and took this race as their discard.

The dominance of the winning boat - the first day jinx laid to rest and apparently the first time a boat has won all 4 races of a full championship - was deserved but also unexpected and the Class will be looking to change the situation as the fleet moves on to Cowes next week. Although the Glover team were invincible the next few places were hotly contested in Bembridge and indeed the 2nd and 3rd places were both tied for.

Bembridge S.C. made the Swallow Class most welcome after a long absence with a tantalising package of excellent organisation, brilliant sailing conditions and wonderful hospitality in the recently enlarged Club. In particular he secretary excelled himself by stripping off his trousers to push off one of the “nanny boats” as it grounded full of Swallow sailors!! The majority of the entrants were from Itchenor but with some most welcome support from Aldeburgh.

Overall Results: