Cherub Open at Isle of Sheppey Sailing Club
by UK Cherub Class 1 May 2014 10:39 BST
26-27 April 2014
Nine teams of battered and bruised Cherub sailors made the trip to the Isle of Sheppey after the tempestuous melee that was Rutland 3 weekends previously.
You may think that you are going to hear about the winners Paul and Peter Jenkins in Cool Beans and their masterful 4 wins out of 6 and a moral victory in the last race after thinking the shortened course signal was them being tooted for a finish, or Dean Ralph and Simon Jones in Eleanor taking a great win in race 5, managing to find wind where others didn't, but no, this story is the second part in the tale of one particular boat. 8 years old, regular crew absent, helm unsure as to whether his stand in crew would be able to fill the big boots left behind by Tim Noyce. Once again, the odds were stacked against Atum Bom. Andy Whappshot (crew for the day) had a stinking cold, and the prospect of sailing with Ben Rushton, a helm who had shared a boat with him for minutes at most prior to this regatta, was filling him with dread.
Now as many of us may know, the key to a successful day's sailing is to start with the right sustenance. However, while distracted by the phallic course set by the RO at IOSSC, our heroes Andy and Ben had forgotten to eat any breakfast. This was realized soon after launching leaving them to race the whole day on empty stomachs getting ever and ever hungrier and having to dig deeper and deeper. The wind was a promising 15kts with some fruiter gusts thrown in for good measure. The added interest today was a tide coupled with the flow of the Thames, which took some by surprise when they missed the lay-lines up the first beat. This was not an issue for Atum who seemed unable to get it wrong, meaning a slight disadvantage in boat speed was made up in most races by tacking only once up the beat. The course for race 1 had been huge and within the fleet there were plenty of 1-on-1's going on. Poppy showed good pace but fortunately for our heroes, they managed to put in their best tack of the weekend at just the right time to take 4th place in front by 3 seconds.
In contrast to race 1, race 2 saw the phallus shrunk to shorten the time out on the course, half the fleet missed this and sailed off into the distance trying to emulate the Atumists 1 tack tactic. A+E went so far before they realized where they were heading, they contemplated hoisting the kite to get back to the windward mark, unfortunately a broken foot loop resulted in a helm, crew, shroud convocation leading to early retirement for the day. Elsewhere on the course, the capsize recovery practice Tim and Ben had put in at Rutland really paid off and while some may see capsizing with the kite up at the leeward mark as a disadvantage, for the Atumists it probably made the drop faster and the round up even sharper than it might have been if they had tried to do it with the mast pointing skyward. A costly capsize by Eleanor on the gybe in this race gave Atum the gap she needed to nip into second place and cross the line seconds before them. After this, energy levels were low and the Atumists were getting desperate. Someone up there was smiling on them though when an ancient Boost bar was found in the depths of a buoyancy aid pocket.
Filled with new energy they took race 3 head on. The newest crew to the fleet, Robin and Steve in Banshee Ambulance, a boat that has not been seen at a Cherub open for a year or so, showed some great potential. They found themselves second round the top mark but a capsize on the downwind leg cost them dear and Eleanor and Atum slipped through to take second and third respectively.
With racing done for the day, all boats and crews then retired to the club where some of the hardier members decided that rum was the order of the day. These people obviously hadn't witnessed the drop in performance of the Atumists at Rutland 3 Sundays back after having tried to keep the local brewery in business the night before. Curries were had by most (if they weren't too distracted by the phallic course diagram and remembered to order them at the briefing) and while some preferred beds, the cold hard floor of the clubhouse suited.
For one Atumist at least, Sunday dawned fuzzily. Far too much red wine and the world's largest measure of whisky had been administered by the competition in an effort to take edge of their performance. Fortunately many others had been out in Sheerness, levelling the playing field.
With the wind down from Saturday, racing promised to be closer and mistakes costlier, Eleanor capsizing on the downwind leg of race two to let Atum through again to take 3rd from Cool Beans and A+E. Elsewhere on the course, Jamie and Digby in Born Slippy (in 05 mode) made a stop off on the beach at Sheerness for ice cream after Digby was unable to pull hard enough for Jamie's pole to come out the front. With that sorted, they joined back for a 2nd race in dying breeze and growing tide. Whilst far from epic, this race was hotly contested and with Cool Beans on 4 bullets everyone was waiting for them to make a mistake. Fortunately for Eleanor, they sailed into a massive hole, which cost them the lead for the first time in this open meeting.
Today's sailing was all about who found the wind. The one tack wonder tactics Atum had so successfully used on Saturday had gone out the window, missing the top mark on almost every lap. The wind came through in waves on the last race but seemed to die completely at times, marginal conditions is not where Atum excels being pushed down into fourth by A+E with substitute crew, Eleanor took another win and Cool Beans who were leading until they decided to head in on the shortened course signal with a lap to go.
A great event from IOSSC where lessons about mid-event drinking need to be learned.
If you are tired of hearing about the antics of the mighty Atumists then you had better up your game and knock us off the podium at Weir Wood on the 17th/18th May.