International 14 Hopton's Trophy at Itchenor Sailing Club - Day 2

Over the weekend of 28th/29th June, the second half of the Hopton's and the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club trophies were competed for.

Hopton's Trophy

After the usual chants to the Race Committee of "Hurrah to Colonel Hopton" or words to that effect (I never remember and it doesn't seem to matter), the Race committee reply with, "The lettuce, James, the lettuce." A very strange tradition.

Now having officially reported in, the racing can commence. The Hopton's is 4 races held over 2 weekends and a result is given for each helm/crew combination, which means that if you switch crews, you can have the odd results of Douglas Pattison coming 7th and 8th! I also means that if you stick with the same crew then you are assured of a good result and so it panned out.

Covering just the 2nd weekend, in the first race, Glen Truswell and Sam sailed an impeccable race and sailed away to a solid 1st, Archie and Harvey a straight-forward 2nd and Douglas followed up with a 3rd. However of the real contenders who sailed the weekend before together, Mark Upton-Brown a 4th and Andy Penman a 5th.

Meanwhile, Andy Partington started well and fought amongst the top 3, until had another teething problem, which prevented him finishing. Equally distraught was Andy Fitz and Rich Dobson politely questioning each other as to who had rigged the kite wrong!

For the 2nd race of the day, the same top 3 of Glen, Archie and Andy Partington raced around neck and neck, with Glen pulling clear before. A capsize on a tack, at the bottom of the second beat, from which he remarkably recovered to round the top mark in 1st! Though a capsize on the 2nd run was too much to recover from.

Meanwhile, Andy Partington sailed straight around the outside of Archie on the run and held steady on the beat to finish the race in 1st. Thus keeping his 100% 2 record of 2-wins-from-2-races completed in the new boat. (We fail to mention the 8 DNFs.)

There was unfortunately a high drop-out rate from the 2nd race as the same increase in wind and adverse tide that caught out Glen and Sam also put-paid to many of the other racers.

Hopton's Trophy Results:

Royal Bermuda Yacht Club Trophy

The RBYC race has none of the idiosyncrasies of the Hoptons and is a one-off 2-race regatta over a big course in the bay. Again we had a shifting Northerly to ensure that the racing was interesting.

The first race was in a steady 8 knots, enough to twin wire, but not excite the adrenaline junkie section of the fleet. It does make for close racing though. The first run saw huge splits over the 1.5 mile course. Anyone could have come in ahead. Instead it resulted in 4 boats rounding the bottom mark together. Glen did eventually sail away to a large win.

Behind him though Archie, Katie and Andy Fitz were in a close battle for 2nd, taking multiple tacks up the middle of the course. Possibly too many. Andy won out around the top mark and proceeded (depressingly for the author of this report) to sail off to a 100yd lead. Katie follow just behind in 4th. Douglas watch most of the race from 5th, never quite getting on the heels of the lead group.

In the second race, the wind had kindly picked up to around 12 knots and constantly threatened to swing from NW to a SW sea-breeze. It never did, but it did allow the luxury of kiting out to the start and back in again.

With the potential sea-breeze and land-breeze competing, there were large shifts to be taken, but aiming for them barely seemed to pay off. However to cut multiple lead changes out, it resulted in Archie and Neale Jones, just pipping Glen and Sam to win the race. Katie finished a solid 3rd a fair way back with Andy Fitz an Andy Partington just behind. Andy's broken winning streak had come to an end.

Well done Glen on a solid weekend's sailing.

Next stop Weymouth Open and then the Europeans in Travemeunde at the end of July.

Royal Bermuda Yacht Club Trophy Results: