National Champion Luke Gower continues his winning streak
by Deryck Lovegrove 12 Nov 2017 17:23 GMT
4-5 November 2017
The OK season finale was held over the weekend of the 4th/5th November at Northampton Sailing Club.
The class would like to say a big thank you to our sponsors for this current year, Rain & Sun, Fernhurst Books, Sandiline and Mayday Chandlery, have all generously supported the class.
A special thanks must go to HD Sails for donating a brand new sail for our use on the demo boat, and in recognition we renamed our pond sailing circuit the HD Inland Series. Rodney Tidd from Overy Staithe won the coveted trophy. Congratulations to Rodney who also became a father this year. Don't know how he fitted it all in!
We also ran the North Sails Super Series, with North Sails kindly donating a brand new sail to us. To qualify competitors had to sail in 4 of the 6 events, five of these were sea events, and the last one was the recent Northampton end of seasons, also the stipulation was you had to include the National Championship.
The series was a very hard fought affair, going down to the wire.
With his win at Northampton, Luke Gower took the trophy Dave Bourne was second, and Tony Woods took the final place on the podium.
This just left us to do the final draw for the brand new North sail. Many names were in the hat, all with a chance of winning, and as the room went silent, Luke Gower's name was drawn.
What a season he has had. National champion at the first attempt, 5th at this year's Europeans, End of season win, and now to add to his trophies a brand new sail. Certainly he is the guy to beat next year!
I would also like to thank North Sails for donating to us last year a signed poster of the 2016 Rio Olympians.
We have now had this framed, and at the Nationals hosted by Herne Bay, we presented it to Terry Curtis, for services to the class. Well deserved.
The OK season starts nice and early next year, kicking off with the winter championships to be held on the 24th February at South Staffs Sailing Club.