Worst Falmouth Week Ever!

Dear Falmouth Week Bay sailors,

Yes, this year's bay regatta courses on Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday were just simply awful - but it was as big a disappointment for the race team as the sailors.  They are friends of mine who I know worked hard and were as diappointed as anyone when the regatta courses simply failed because of unkind shifting wind conditions rubbishing the course set.  They learnt a lesson and want to come back next year and sort it.  They have exciting embryo plans to lay trapeziodal type courses with an assistant race officer on each leg to relay the windward mark on a wind shift to keep the course true with the wind.  What more can a sailor ask for?

Give the race officer and his team fair due, they did set a extra super tapeziodal course on the Friday which gave superb competitive racing with the first 6 boats in IRC A class finishing within 71 seconds of each other after 2 1/2 hours racing - not bad?

Falmouth simply has the cleanest, best sailing waters combined with the best club hospitality anywhere.  My crew had a great time and we are making it our number one priority for the 2008 sailing season

Good sailing everyone and see you in Falmouth in 2008

For what its worth I think some of the feedback here is a little harsh.  We were racing in the bay and had a fantastic week's sailing - good mix of courses and only one day where it was a bit of a procession owing to a windshift and I think there were boats on every leg so the windward mark couldnt be shifted.   As far as I am aware, the organisers visited a lot of the local clubs to see what people wanted - certainly we had an email from our class captain asking what we wanted in terms of courses....  we got exactly what we wanted and had a cracking time.  I also thought the race officer in the bay was very approachable, made the starting sequence and courses really clear  and was supportive of less experienced crews....  I would recommend the week to anyone.

Where criticism is justified is in the social side of things - it might have been better if the results could have made it to the clubs a bit sooner - but my main gripe was the shifting of the eveing ents to the Pavillions - Carribean Night was a disaster (last year it was a fantastic night out!) - so much so that they actually refunded our tickets.  The atmosphere at events square was really lacking too - probably as the two venues split the custom.....   it was also noticable that there were not many sailors evident at either places.  

Did Falmouth Regatta Week happen?

Don't know, you tell me. I'm a local competitor and I was not impressed with the week for a number of reasons. Firstly, there wasn't any regatta atmosphere. The event was badly advertised and the racing was a shambles. The races were not long enough and the courses were badly set. I had taken the week off work and i wish I hadn't.  

I was also unimpressed with the race committee. For instance on monday the race committee set a course with the windward mark on the western side of the bay, where there happened to be a shipping movement, so instead of postponing for 30 - 45 minutes they started, which meant the front of the fleet sailed in front of a rather large ship but were able to pass safely at about 100meters across the ships bow. The pilots weren’t very happy about this so the race committee gave warning to the two offending yachts and no further action was taken on that day. The race committee said that the two offending yachts acted stupidly and irresponsibly. In my mind the race committee were more irresponsible for starting the race and should have known better.

re posting from urbantiger, on shipping movements incidents, Falmouth Bay is  now increasingly busy with the bunkering demand for low carbon fuel. There now many daily shipping movements every week. PoFSA and all the local clubs have a superb working relationship with the pilots and there was full cooperation and only one problem when the red mist descended and two yacts skippers had a moment of madness.I was part of the race committee and right there when this incident happened. The pilots where as surprised as I as at the momentary lack of judgement of the boats concerned but left it to the Race Committee to resolve and there was no formal complaint. The Race Officer decided thet a birsk talking to would suffice and that no further action was required. The protest was not a race committee action. Frequent shipping movements in Falm oputh Bay are now an established practice. We work well with the Pilots and there mopstly no problems when skippers react to requests from race committee safety boats