Wayfarer Open at Waldringfield Sailing Club

16 teams for the Wayfarer open at Waldringfield © Steve Collins

16 teams for the Wayfarer open at Waldringfield © Steve Collins

A small but high quality fleet of 16 boats gathered for Waldringfield SC’s Wayfarer Open over the weekend of 2/3 August, which was an event forming a part of the UKWA National Circuit this year. They were treated to a weekend of the best possible sailing.

Visitors from Parkstone, Shoreham and the Rivers Thames and Medway were warmly welcomed to join in with what must be the toughest home Wayfarer fleet to compete in. A southwest wind of never less than a F4 gave some exciting planing on the windward/leeward courses on Saturday, where the course was set in the Rocks area of the river Deben.

Two back-to-back races were held over the top of the tide with Roger Challis and Mark Johnston quickly establishing a substantial lead in both races. Colin May and Tim Archer had a race-long duels with Colin and Martin Johnson in these to take the runners-up spots. After a refreshment break, racing resumed with Mike and Rani Pert having recovered from their errors in finishing fifth in the two earlier races to quickly take the lead but being harried all the way by Gordon Harris and Simon Howlett.

A fine days racing was completed with a steak barbeque on the club’s terrace. Sunday’s first race was equally fiercely contested with the Perts closely covering Harris/Howlett to let Challis/Johnston through. A tight tacking duel on each windward leg saw them finish in that order with only a few boat lengths separating the three at the finish. Meanwhile the Johnsons had their own concerns with keeping May/Archer behind them for much of the race, but were finally overtaken near the finish.

With the Perts and Challis/Johnston each having two wins, the fifth race became the decider. The Perts were quickly up the front though troubled early on by Brian Lamb, however Challis/Johnston were buried in the pack from which they never recovered to challenge the leaders. A good running leg from Harris/Howlett saw them come from nearly last to slot into third by the leeward mark before overhauling Lamb on the next beat, but they had lost too much ground on the Perts to attack them.

So with the Perts having got over their disastrous beginning to the weekend, then posting three straight wins, they just emerged as the winners on count back.

Roger Challis and Mark Johnston’s second place overall at Waldringfield was sufficient to move them ahead of Colin Many and into first place overall in the UKWA 50th Anniversary National Circuit series after three races. The next race in the five race series is at Upper Thames SC in September.

Overall Results: