Flying 15 Open at Grafham Water Sailing Club

Flying Fifteens at Grafham © Richard Janulewicz / www.fotoboat.com

Flying Fifteens at Grafham © Richard Janulewicz / www.fotoboat.com

Saturday dawned bright and clear to greet 17 teams, including 6 visitors, for the annual Flying 15 Open Meeting at Grafham Water SC.

A relatively steady westerly airflow prevailed for the day with wind speeds ranging from 7-8 knots in the lulls to peaks of 15-16 kts. Shifts were there to be had but picking them correctly proved to be more difficult.

'Never go in without protection' is a wise adage but one local team who I won't name took this advice to extremes and sailed out to the start line with the rudder bag still attached! Good tip for our GBR Olympic hopefuls in 2012 – this is slow!

The Race Officer set a standard Olympic course for 6 races over the 2 days with 3 minute starts, which certainly everyone on their toes.

Race one saw plenty of shifts down the course but the left side came good in the last 200yds of the beat and Kneller/Lucas (sans rudder bag) got lifted in on port and set off on the first reach with 5 boat lengths on Wells/Darling. The reach went very broad and Wells/Darling were able to creep down on the leading boat.

The second reach was tight and a struggle to 3 sail but Wells/Darling stayed high and got the jump on Kneller/ Lucas and kept this lead to the finish with Bax/Busby getting past Kneller to the finish.

Race 2 followed a similar course but with Kneller/Lucas switching into 2nd and Bax/Busby into 3rd. By Race 3 the breeze had picked up nicely and was touching 18-20 kts by the time the last reaches were sailed. Wells was right on Kneller's transom down the 2nd to last reach with some dramatic course changing required to prevent Wells from charging past to windward. Both boats reached the gybe mark very close together with Kneller just ahead and clear to gybe, as both boats went through the gybe a twinning line went ‘ping' on the trailing boat- Kneller getting a boat lengths breathing space. Once again the final reach was very tight to 3 sail and once again, Wells got past to windward. However it soon became clear that the reach was too tight for a spinnaker and the race became who could drop first. In the end Kneller Lucas got the billowing material into some semblance of order and two sailed to the finish with Wells/Darling close behind. Once again, Bax and Busby kept a watching brief in 3rd.

Day 2

A forecast for more breeze greeted competitors on the Sunday but if anything a more shifty SSW breeze was coming off large build ups of cumulous clouds forming up from the west.

The Wells/Darling combination proved difficult to beat and put in two straight wins making the last race unnecessary for them. However, there was a lot of action back in the fleet with Knight/Knight getting right up with the leaders in race 5 (4th) Cave and Thomas putting in 2 5ths to end on a high note and visitors Castle and Barford scoring a 3rd in the last race. Bax/Busby took the last race making the scoring very close for 2nd and 3rd overall.

A great two days of racing and a big thank you to the Race Officer and his team who did a great job with turning races round and setting good Olympic courses and to GWSC for once again showing what a great inland venue it is.

Overall Results: