XOD Central Solent Champs at Royal Air Force Yacht Club
by Eddie Mays 23 Jul 2007 21:45 BST
21-22 July 2007
Several boats from the Itchenor Division joined the Hamble fleet for this annual pre-cursor to Cowes Week. Hosted by the R.A.F. Y.C. the regatta was run over the weekend of the 21st & 22nd July. Although there was one rain-squall during Saturday afternoon the weather improved as the weekend progressed and on Sunday the conditions could not have been better.
The race team ran four windward / leeward races on Saturday afternoon and each race produced a new winner. In fact nine boats shared the podium places during the afternoon and everyone had at least one good and most had one poor result. With races only lasting 45 minutes there was no time for the crews to dwell on what had just happened. In fact some crews felt that there wasn't enough time allowed to enjoy a well-earnt lunch break between the races.
First blood went to Itchenor's Ted Roose helming 'Thora' ahead of Mark Jardine on Eliot Motherwell's 'Josephine' with last year's Captain's Cup winner Peter Baines on board John Harding's 'Calypso' third. The Hamble boats then made a clean sweep of Race 2. Simon Russell, 'Swallow', took the gun with the oldest boat X13 'Mischief' (Diana Wilson) 2nd and past Captain's Cup winner David Oddie helming 'Magic Dragon' 3rd. A temporary wind shift at the start of Race 3 made the first leg rather one-sided but a strategically placed leeward mark improved the second beat. Keith Hughes sailing 'Leading Wind' made the best of the conditions and took the win ahead of 'Swallow' and North Sail's Richie Bell driving MOS Fitzgerald's 'Kathleen' in 3rd place. With the wind building to over 25 kts the final race was a real dash. At the end of the first lap Itchenor boats held the first three places but in the end, although Peter Taylor, 'Felix' held the lead both 'Kathleen' & 'Swallow' made up ground to gain valuable places. At the Bar-B-Que at the R.A.F. clubhouse in the evening there was a day's prizegiving courtesy of Musto & Hyde Sails.
With racing not scheduled until mid-day on Sunday the wind had time to build and the first of the two short 'Round the Cans' started on time. The wind stayed remarkably stable during the whole racing period and it was easy to set a Figure-of-Eight course that gave the boats two good beats and two shy spinnaker reaches, just the job before Cowes. There were yet more new faces at the head of the fleet. Race 1 went to 'Kathleen' and the final race went to 'Calypso' but throughout the weekend the racing was extremely tight and on several occasions there were blanket finishes between groups of boats. When the points were added up and the worst result discarded Simon Russell emerged as the winner by two points from John Harding and Peter Taylor. Harding took 2nd place by counting back his best results, both having won a race apiece.
Back at the club afterwards there were prizes for the two race winners provided by Yachts & Yachting. The main prizegiving will be made at the Association's main reception at the end of the season.