Cherub Inland Championship at Queen Mary Sailing Club

Clive & Alex Everest during the Cherub Inlands at Queen Mary © Isabel Joce

With a forecast verging into foiling range for Cherubs anticipation hung thickly in the air at Queen Mary Sailing Club for the Cherub Inlands. With 2 boats showing up with additional horizontals on their rudder and daggerboards who would be faster over the series, the 8 tortoises or the 2 hares?

The first day was held in light to medium breezes under leaden skies. With sole use of the larger side of QM the race officer was able to set a sizable course that enabled 3 races pushing an hour long each to be held. The breeze was definitely sub-epic for foiling with Clive Everest and Joe White in A&E occasionally flying and Graeme and Eddie Bridle in Riot Van stuck a little more firmly to the surface. So definitely a day for the tortoises. Andy and Jill Peters in Usagi (a rabbit not a tortoise) we the quickest of the day posting 3 firsts. Challenging hard were Jonny and Alex in Ronin with 3 second places. Third and fourth on the day was fought out by Roland Trim's 2 boats. Luckily for Roland his newer boat with him in it beat his older boat with the fleets Destruction Duo in it. Even better for Roland the Destruction Duo were off form and the only things they broke on Saturday was themselves – and that had nothing to do with sailing.

In the evening Nick and Jo generously hosted their first (and likely last) cherub house party to celebrate Nick's 30th. Suffice to say there was a lot of food consumed and even more drink. Apparently Nicks house is a halt on the Jager-train and at least one of the Destruction Duo was comprehensively de-railed.

Sunday dawned bright and slightly breezy. Breezy enough for Clive and Alex to be sporting wide grins and even Graham was tempted to the start-line. Again 3 races were held, the speed of some of the boats tempting the race office into adding an extra lap to the middle race for a 5 lap marathon. Race one started in ominous silence from a couple of boats – yes the foilers were up and off. Like with many things in life apparently size does matter when it comes to foils. Clive has a large one and Graham a small one! Certainly on Sunday a large one was better and Clive foiled away to winning 2 of the 3 races. In the right conditions a foiling hare is clearly faster than surface hugging tortoises. Grahame was a little more variable showing great speed in a straight line, unfortunately that line only rarely coincided with the layout of the course. Scared hare perhaps?

Of the tortoises Andy and Jill were again the fastest winning one face but they were even more hotly pursued by Ronin with places changing several times each race. Action in the rest of the fleet was equally hot with Nick in Cheese beating Roland by the merest of seconds in race 4. After taking the first race out to de-train Robin had obviously got to grips with his loan E5 to post 2 fourth places proving there is good life and durability these days in EJ.

Andrew and Jill Peters win the Cherub Inlands at Queen Mary - photo © Isabel Joce

So when all the boats has settled back into the water evidence proved that over a range of conditions the tortoises are still faster than hares. It is only though a matter of time before the big feet of the hares propel them over the water in a wider range of winds and they are able to more closely challenge. So after 6 good races Andy and Jill Peters are the 2015 Cherub Inland Champions, Alex and Johnny Harris were second and Clive and Alex/Joe were first foiler and third.

Overall Results: