Ramsgate Week 2017 - Day 5
by Martin Law 28 Jul 2017 08:11 BST
23-28 July 2017
Cruising classes started upwind at the club line. The strong following tide made the line approach difficult to judge necessitating a general recall for Class 6. After a short beat into Pegwell Bay the fleet headed down to Broadstairs and back to Ramsgate.
For the first two hours the conditions were some of the mildest seen all week with 10-12 knot WSW, but on the homeward leg the wind backed and strengthened to the familiar 20-25 kts.
Making progress against the building spring tide was challenging and not possible for the smaller yachts in the fleet, forcing five retirements. The cumulative battering that the boats had taken over this windy week began to show, a number of breakages occurred and the RNLI had to be called to help two yachts back to shore.
Class 5 was won by Chris Denby's Raquel, an Elan 340. Second was Rush, Ken Lees' Sigma 35 taking them to equal second in the series so far. Third was Frank Barrett's Maverick, an Elan 333 who lead the series by two points.
Class 6 was won by Tim French's Zephyros a Dehler 34, with the Netherlands boat Mallemok second and Mallard third. Mallemok currently lead the series with Mallard second and David Appleton's Impala Shoestring third.
The class 7 race was won by Splash, an RTYC boat owned by Ken Welch with Avventura second and Bernard Sealy's Karibia Breezes third. This cement's Bernard Sealy's position at the top of the class 7 leaderboard, five points clear of Avventura.
The IRC 1 and 2 boats completed two races today. A win and an equal second saw Richard Matthew's Oystercatcher XXXI retain their lead in the series. Delft got the better of their countrymen Team Heiner today with a second and an equal second despite having partied late into Wednesday night at the Royal Temple 80s disco. Delft are now second in the series and Team Heiner third.
After Slingback's (John Barrett and Paul Woodward) win today they are tied with Slingshot (Rod Oates and Gavin Magee) for the Class 2 series on seven points each. Mike and Jo Brand's Foxy is three points behind. With one more day of racing the series trophy is still there for the taking.
Full results at www.ramsgateweek.com