Monday Evening Dinghy Racing at Royal Lymington YC - Early Season Finale

RLymYC Monday Evening Dinghy Racing Early Series finale © Ann Brunskill

RlymYC Race officer Steve Green and his team set the intrepid Optimist fleet off first for the last race in the Club's early Monday Night Dinghy Racing series. Sam Webb took another win to add to his near-perfect series score, with Hugh Anderson and Ollie Baddeley chasing. Jake Stokes retired but managed to hold onto his second place in the series by a point ahead of Anderson.

In the Slow Handicap, the Laser 4.7s dominated. Ted Ward got off to a flying start and led to the finish, fending off the challenge from series winner Isabella Drewitt and Ewan Horn. Next up were the Fevas, battling it out for second place overall in the series. Alex Paton and Jasmine Summers beat Euan Etheridge and William Homewood in the race, but were tied on points and most firsts, so the boys' second place in race 7 won them the tie-break.

The Medium fleet series had already been sewn up by Richard Russell and Sylvia Weger, but they went out for a lap of honour and sailed with Slow fleet. John Claridge and Pete Sanders' won in the Seafly and they finished one point behind Russell and Weger overall in the serie; Karl Thorne in his Aero was third.

For the Fast fleet it was a match race between Nigel Walbank's Musto Skiff and Luke and Emma McEwen's RS800. Unfortunately Walbank's spinnaker halyard broke on the first run, leaving the McEwens to win the race and the series. Rob and Jan Martin were a close second in the series in their RS400, with Ed Reeves' RS700 third.

The 11 Scows in the Gold Fleet had an exciting reach down to the first mark before turning upwind and into the tide for the first beat. All boats chose to tack in towards Oxey to avoid the tide but many found themselves ploughing the mud well offshore and Nik Froud had to jump out and push the boat into deeper water twice. Despite the strong winds it was a night for light crews Ollie Tait and crew finished first, Chris Cecil-Wright, crewed by his young daughter Grace came second with Nik and Lindsey Froud finishing third.

Overall winners of the Early series were Chris and Grace Cecil-Wright, Eric Williams was second and Ollie Tait (with various crew) was third.

First in the Silver Fleet were Scows newcomers, Stuart and Caroline Watson. Nigel Russell and Claire Sowrey. came second and Angus Raby in Ping Pong was third. Overall Auk ll was the winner with Pel Bruce second and John Evans third.

Full results at rlymyc.org.uk/OnTheWater/Racing/Race_Results.aspx