International 14 Prince of Wales Cup Race

Glen Truswell and Sam Pascoe win the 2014 International 14 Prince of Wales Cup Race © Mike Lennon

Glen Truswell and Sam Pascoe win the International 14 Prince of Wales Cup Race © Mike Lennon

Glen Truswell and Sam Pascoe win the International 14 Prince of Wales Cup Race © Mike Lennon

This year's POW will go down in history! It was an epic 48 miles on the GPS in 14 knots building to 28 knots.

It all started with the perverse idea of calling "one lap" a sausage and a triangle, then the class asking for the usual 6-laps. What's normally an hour and three-quarters turned into 3 hours for the leader out in Weymouth Bay.

The start was perfect conditions, rolling swell from the south and small chop from upwind and 15 knots. 14s at their best. Douglas Pattison and Mark Tait pulled off the port flyer and crossed the fleet comfortably. Meanwhile Glen Truswell and Sam Pascoe tacked out from the starboard end, leaving just these 2 out on the right hand side. Meanwhile the rest of fleet hacked out to the left. Archie Massey and Harvey Hillary were first to tack and take the transoms of Martin Jones and son and Julian Pearson and Nick Martin. By the top mark, Glen Truswell had got the better of Pattison/Tait and Massey/Hillary led the left hand fleet. The Jones rounded 3rd in their brand new boat and first time on the water. Unfortunately their tie-lite halyard block proved a little too light and gave up the ghost a lap later.

By the end of the run, Truswell/Pascoe led Massey/Hillary by a few boat lengths and McGrane/Hughes had pulled through to 3rd, but a hundred yards back. By the first gybe mark, Massey/Hillary had briefly taken the lead, but this was the end of their charge, as on the first beat, their jib cleat failed, which slowly took its toll on upwind performance and crew.

When the race officer had realised his laps mistake, he was kind enough to shorten the beat to shrink the course down a bit. Expecting a right-hand course change, both the lead 2 massively over stood the shortened windward mark allowing McGrane/Hughes to close right up. This allowed him to eventually pass Massey/Hillary who were visibly tiring on about lap 5. (They all blurred onto one to be honest).

Meanwhile, Pattison/Tait were having a very solid race in 4th pulling gently clear of the chasing fleet, until Tait pulled out his guns on lap 8 and shredded the kite. They then had to do 4 legs downwind without the kite. Luckily for them, the reaches were generally tight enough to 2-sail and big right shift and increase in pressure allowed the runs to be flat-out planing. However, they did eventually get passed by Bone/Rodway. Guttingly for McGrane/Hughes, their forestay adjuster chafed through and failed on lap 10, thus ending their race too. They did eventually tie it back up after 20 mins in the water and sail back in. Pearson/Martin was charging fast at the end, but didn't quite make it through the ailing Pattison/Tait. Fitz/Dobson slid into a solid 5th, proving that you can get your crew into the crew's union whilst single-wiring downhill, for which he later won a comfy director's chair.

From lap 2 onwards, Glen Truswell gently pulled away upwind and ultimately completed the 13 beats with a good half-leg lead. The fleet was just close enough to see him wear-around the final gybe mark.

Glen Truswell and Sam Pascoe win the International 14 Prince of Wales Cup Race - photo © Mike Lennon

Congratulations Glen for winning the Nationals, adding it to the Europeans that he won a month before. A 14 legend in the making...

That evening the crews union welcomed in 4 new members, an unprecedented number. After a tame initiation for the new crews, they took down the helms with the losing helm taking down a rum and kidney bean cocktail! Time to start the "Helm's revenge club".

Prince of Wales Cup Race Results:
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