Crouch Yacht Club Former Commodores Bonanza

Former Commodores Challenge Race and Open IRC Race

As part of the Crouch Yacht Club’s extensive Centenary Celebrations this year on 23 June the Club hosted a special invitational race to mark and acknowledge all of the substantial contributions from their past Commodores. This was a unique sailing occasion with eight former Commodores (plus their current incumbent) racing on IRC boats generously lent by their owners for the day. Also past Commodore Brian Prew lent his yacht ‘Beta’ and acted as Assistance Race Officer to Alf Reynolds (himself a past Commodore at neighbouring Burnham Sailing Club).

Notwithstanding the seniority of some of the skippers it was clear that their racing prowess and skills were still very evident. The start was as fiercely contested as any seen in yacht racing on the river this year with Chorus Line (Jo Barker) from a lower position manoeuvring Ace of Hearts (Danny Donoghue) into an OCS position. Ace of Hearts recovered quickly and made steady progress to near the front of the fleet by the end of the race.

A 10/15 knot westerly with shifts off the southern shore and foul tide beating meant strategic racing. Amazon (Frank Curtis) led the fleet from soon after the start but as highest rated boat could not quite stretch this enough and in the end it turned out that the lower rating boats filled the first three places. David Lenz the current Chairman of the Burnham Joint Clubs Committee helming Jiminy Cricket was a very popular winner followed by Mike Harrison in Harvest Moon and in third place Mike Willett in Ermintrude. The whole fleet were within a few minutes on corrected time.

After the race past Commodore Peter Cashel hosted a cocktail party on his maginificent 85 foot barge which he had brought to Burnham from the South of France specifically for this event and in the evening a dinner was held in the club house where all of the former Commodores were again thanked and acknowledged.

A highlight of the afternoon was a very well organised sail past by the Royal Burnham Yacht Club’s one design fleet of Royal Burnham’s led by RBOD 1. The class are celebrating their 75th anniversary this year and both clubs welcomed the opportunity to mutually congratulate each other on their respective anniversaries. The RNLI also made a visit to offer their congratulations to the CYC on their Centenary.

Overall Results:

1st David Lenz (Jiminy Cricket)
2nd M.Harrison (Harvest Moon)
3rd Mike Willett (Ermintrude)

The following day the Club organised and ran in wet conditions an open IRC race and raced for the Nick Poole trophy, a magnificent RN ceremonial sword generously presented by Nick for this event.

Sunday Results:

1st Jiminy Cricket, M. Harrison
2nd Zipper, Russ Smith
3rd Harvest Moon, Paul Drew