Enterprise South East Area Championship at Papercourt Sailing Club

The South East Area Championship for the Enterprise Class were held at Papercourt Sailing Club on Sunday 4th October.

Race officer Andy Boyce and his team got the fleet ready to race even though the lake was mirror smooth with not a breath of wind.. However after a short delay the wind settled in to a light southerly and racing was able to commence. The Enterprises were sharing the race course with the Graduate fleet. This is a good idea now that fleet numbers in many classes are lower - the tactical challenges of other boats on the race course effectively mimic many of the challenges of racing in a larger fleet.

At the start of race 1 a lift favouriNg the committee boat end put Ann Jackson and Alan Skeens into a immediate lead, closely followed by David Beaney and Sarah Hirst- Malin. This order remained the same for 3 laps with David and Sarah looking unsuccesfully for a way to overtake, however on lap 4 an opportunity arose and David and Sarah moved into the lead and gradually extended their advantage to the end of the race. Paul Young his crew Nancy Gudgeon from Midland Sailing Club held 3rd place for most of the race but was overtaken by Chris Rowsell and Alison Butlertoward the end of the race. Homefleet honours went to David Hodgson and crew Sue Whitehill.

Race 2 was sailed back to back and started in a similar fashion with Ann Jackson leading away from the start, but in this race Ann extended her lead to win comfortably. David fell behind Chris Rowsell and Paul Young for a time but finished strongly to regain 2nd place with Paul Young following in 3rd place.

The fleet retired to the shore for lunch - which was excellently timed as the wind seemed to die again. For race 3, with the race officers permission David changed crew and home club regular Sue Michelmore took over from Sarah. After some place changing on the first beat David and Sue built a comfortable lead which they held to the finish with Ann in a comfortable 2nd place.

With three races to count out of 4, given the results so far and the tiebreak rules, whoever won the last race between David and Ann was going to win the championships However after 3 races in light and changeable winds but where the beat was a beat and the offwind legs remained offwind legs, the wind decided to have some fun for race 4.

Going up the first beat there was a massive port tack lift. Initially this worked to David's advantage, but approaching the mark Ann got a further lift and moved from directly behind rounding the mark first. On lap 2 the same thing happened in reverse with David lifting from directly behind Ann to claim the lead at the windward mark. At this point the Enterprise fleet had caught a cluster of Graduates and it became a game of mobile chess plotting a way round the other boats without letting an enterprise overtake.

During this period of congestion Paul Young moved up and claimed an inside overlap on Ann at the leeward mark, and a small collision meant Ann had to do a penalty turn. Why Ann chose to fall out of her boat while performing the penalty remains a mystery to her crew, but the dip reinvigorated her and she quickly regained 2nd place. Chris Grainger took home club honours in the final race.

Overall Results: (top three)

1 David Beaney and Sarah Hirst-Malin / Sue Michelmore, 3pts
2 Ann Jackson and Alan Skeens, 5pts
3 Paul Young and Nancy Gudgeon, 10pts