Fat Face RS200 Circuit at Highcliffe Sailing Club

Geoff Carveth & Toby Lewis having a blast during on Sunday at Highcliffe © Pete Emerson

Dave and Jane Hivey trying to take off on Sunday at Highcliffe © Pete Emerson

Now we raced on Sunday!

Round 5 of the RS200 Fat Face series saw the 200s return to the very popular venue of Highcliffe who hosted a very successful GUL RS200 Nationals in 2005. True to form the club laid on a great event, Sunday's sailing will live in the memory for ever. Yes whilst it appears every other event on the south and east coast was cancelled no such thought entered the mind of the Highcliffe race team and the RS200/400s completed three races with numerous swims but with no real problems but more of that later.

44 200’s arrived at the start line for race 1 on Saturday in 10-12 knots from the south. The first black flag of the day caught out 9 boats and some leading contenders. Marshall King/Emma Clarke, Dave/Jane Hivey and Pete Vincent/Tessa Nicholls arrived at the first mark together and after two laps of a monster course finished in that order.

PRO Pete Bell and team did a neat job of shortening the course for race 2 in a building breeze. Geoff Carveth with guest crewing star Toby Lewis nailed the pin end and were well clear at the first mark. A navigation error towards the end of the race allowed Roger Gilbert/Jane Willan some hope but not enough, the Hiveys were third.

Roger and Jane obviously decided they had enough of mucking around down the fleet and not being in their usual lead position, won the start in race 3 and disappeared into a rude lead, Nick Charles/Juliet Kingsnorth passed Geoff/Tobytastic on the final run to claim second. It had been a top day on the water.

Sunday was lovely and sunny but there did appear to be a lot of wind blowing through the dinghy park and there looked a lot of white out to sea. Most competitors went to the club house for breakfast expecting an abandoned go home early decision which the majority would not have disagreed with to find a race team busy preparing. Now let's be honest here, there were a lot of competitors thinking the race team had lost their marbles and there was a very apprehensive dinghy park but PRO Pete Bell was fully vindicated. The majority of the fleet launched and raced in mean winds of 23-28 knots with gusts on top; Highcliffe SC website has a great weather station log. There was some small scale breakages but not one boat had to be towed in showing how rugged these little boats are.

Race 4 and the second lightest helm out there led, Sarah Allan/Simon Haighton led for two laps before first Roger Gilbert/Jane Willan and then Nick Charles/Juliet Kingsnorth slipped by. In race 5 Roger/Jane worked their way through to win from Marshall King/Emma Clarke and Geoff/Tobytastic. Roger/Jane and Geoff/Toby had an OCS so had to count whatever they scored in the race leaving the overall winner very open going into the last race which was just big as the sea increased with the tide now against wind. Geoff and Roger were very close on the first run but Roger capsized on a gybe. Geoff/Toby went on to win the race from Andy/Jill Peters and Marshall/Emma. Roger/Jane finished 9th meaning that Geoff and Toby won overall by a point. 19 boats finished the last race, ashore there were so many broken bodies and so many stories to tell.

Well done to Pete Bell and the whole race/rescue team from Highcliffe SC for sticking to their guns and laying on such a huge day.

Hannah Yuill/Andy Robertson won the silver division completing most of race 6 taking the mainsheet from the boom after big brute of a crew fell over knocking off the mainsheet swivel base, ratchet and cleat! Simon Gillow/Adam Page were second and Katrina Gilbert/Jenny Rust third. Matt and Ellie Shearhan won the bronze completeing two of the races on Sunday from Wes Kangurs/Jo Munro.

Overall Results: