Optimist Race Clinic at Leigh & Lowton Sailing Club
by Alan Williams 20 Apr 2015 20:45 BST
11-12 April 2015
The North Optimists converged on Leigh and Lowton Sailing club, one of the new High Performance Clubs for a race clinic over the weekend of 11-12 April. Sailors made the journey from the north east, north west and midlands for an extremely windy weekend with sometimes oceanic conditions down at the bottom of the lake.
On Saturday the sailors worked on boat handling and boat speed in15-20kts of blustery wind, whilst trying to dodge the rapidly depleting Phantom open meeting fleet. The afternoon saw some short course racing, working on windward mark bear-aways. We were up against the western shore which was very shifty with monster gusts.
Sunday morning was supposed to start off with a howling gale, however it was calmer to start off with, and quite a lot of upwind speed work, and how to bail successfully was covered in the 15-20kt south westerly wind.
We went in for lunch just as the cold front started to pass, and the wind started to increase to 40+ knots complete with driving rain. After lunch we spend a little time in the safety boat shed working on rigs, and then as the front cleared we were back out on the water for an afternoon of racing.
At the end of the weekend prizes were awarded for effort, 'light bulb' moments and racing.
Thanks to Chris Leigh for organising the weekend, the coaches, and Leigh and Lowton Sailing Club who made us very welcome.