Firefly Open at Budworth Sailing Club
by Steve Hayward 20 Jul 2016 12:38 BST
16 July 2016
Budworth Firefly Open © Peter Cull
Force 1 westerly wind, cloudy, 18 degreesC, intermittent drizzle and a tricky day ahead for competitors at Budworth Firefly open meeting.
With 3 races and one discard in the programme Keith Macaulay and daughter Chloe, South Staffordshire SC got to work immediately, leading from the front and were clear winners of race 1 followed by Chris and Liz Kameen, West Kirby SC in second place and Deborah Love and Jon Sutcliffe, Budworth SC in third place.
Budworth or Marbury Mere as it is known locally, is a picturesque 100 acre lake in north Cheshire and has herons, seabirds and at this time of the year, swifts, swallows and house martins, giving a wonderful atmospheric feeling to the place, particularly when they are low flying. Almost like the Firefly really!
So race 2 followed a similar pattern but the gap between Macaulay and Kameen was narrower this time.
Keith and Chloe had done enough and were winners after two races. Chris and Liz won race 3 to secure second place overall and consistent sailing in the difficult shifty conditions by Deborah Love and Jon Sutcliffe gave them third place overall.
It was also good to see visitors from Oxford University and Cambridge University.
Any open meeting competitors can hire a Firefly at Budworth for £5 which can make life a lot easier 'on the day' as we have a fleet of 6 Fireflys, all of which are in very good condition with new sails and rigs.
Later this year the Budworth Pairs 2 boat team racing event is back after many years hiatus. A favourite in the team racing world it will be run on Saturday 26 / Sunday 27 November 2016 so anyone who is interested should contact Wendy Martin, or Steve Hayward, as the invitations will be sent out shortly.