Royal Lymington Yacht Club Nordic Folkboats Saturday Series Race 3
by Chris Baldwick on 9 May
6 May 2017
Despite the surprisingly low turnout last Saturday afternoon, the six competing Folkboats faced a range of challenges, frustrations, exultation and confusion.
In a softening breeze from the North East and a gentle flooding tide the Race Officer set a beat to a mark to the East of the starting platform. It was a classic case of "when the wind is in the north, go north!". Those who did and went to the north shore on starboard tack won out massively with a large backing wind shift seeing Madeleine (Ed Donald), Lady Linda (David Gredley) and Pilgrim (Sally Kalis), pulling away from Padfoot, Samphire and Joss, all of whom stayed further out, giving them a convincing lead at the first mark.
A reach and then a run down to Oxey gave everyone a light and fairly tactical spinnaker leg followed by another beat, through the gate and back to the mark for another lap of the track.
Madeleine didn't put a foot wrong, extending her lead with Pilgrim and Lady Linda jockeying for 2nd place with Padfoot and Samphire challenging.......until the last run of the race where Madeleine, Lady Linda and Samphire entered the exclusion zone inside the starting platform and were consequently disqualified!
So the final results had Pilgrim 1st, Padfoot 2nd and Joss 3rd. A challenging day of highs and lows and great to see Madeleine, Lady Linda and Pilgrim giving the rest of the fleet a lesson in sailing skills although the final results reminded us all that a large part of winning a race happens before even getting on the boat, by reading the Sailing Instructions!
Thanks to the Race Officer, Paul Stickley, for running a good course and to the competitors for the excellent competition!
Results can be found on the RLymYC website Folkboat section here.