Dart 18 European Championship at Mumbles Yacht Club - Day 4
by Ria Woffinden, MYC 22 Aug 2014 12:08 BST
18-23 August 2014
Day 4 and the morning didn't look particularly promising for a good day of racing ahead with the sea looking glassy and not one flag in the cat park even fluttering, but with a big weather front expect to arrive from 11am onwards there was no hint of a potential postponement.
Race 7
The wind had started to fill in as predicted around the race area but the launch area was still a little light, as a result the start was delayed to allow the fleet to slowly makes their way over. With 1 minute to go we saw the raising of the AP flag due to a 20 degree wind shift which increased to 60 degrees, it soon settled back to its original bearing at about 15 knots and the race went ahead cleanly. Yet again a new winner, this time it was the French boat of Emmanuel Dode and Fi Goegebeur
Race 8
With the wind forecasted to be increasing to 30 knots and the rain due to increase as the day went on everyone was keen to get the next race underway without any delays. Either the fleet had the same sense of urgency, they had got to grips with the tides or if they were too tired after the dancing the night before to fight the line but we had our second clean start of the day. A number of boats retired early, with broken main sails being the day's damage of choice, one even derigged on the water and borrowed the sail off another de-masted boat to make it into race 8. This time it was David Lloyd and Eloise Knott on their boat dinghyinsure.com who come home in first place.
With one day and 2 races left Dan Norman and Jenni Lloyd lead the championship from David Lloyd and Eloise Knott by 10 points but with the second discard coming into play as long as one of today's races go ahead its all to sail for!
More photographs can be found at dart18europeans2014.org/photos
dart18europeans2014.org