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RC Laser TT at Hawley Lake

by Class Association 11 Oct 2004 16:36 BST 10 October 2004
The last RC Laser race of the season gets underway in blustery conditions at Hawley lake © John Tushingham

Ricky Tagg finished off the 2004 RC Laser TT series the way he started, with a win. The final venue of the eight event series was held at Hawley Lake, a great venue even boasting its own white sandy beach as the rigging area. Blue skies and a light but shifty breeze got the fleet of sixteen boats off to some tight racing.

Tim Davison and Ricky made the early running with two wins apiece, but unfortunately Tim succumed to gear problems later in the day which meant he finished the day counting two retirements to put him out of overall contention. John Tushingham eventually clocked up a win in the fifth after a rather messy start to the day.

A longer than planned lunch break was then forced on the fleet after a dispute with the M.O.D. police over access rights to the shore area in use for the RC lasers. After a few frantic phone calls all was peacefully resolved, and racing once again commenced in increasingly blustery conditions, small 'C rigs' being very much the order of the day. Ricky, suitably refueled with coffee showed no mercy, clocking up an impressive tally of four wins from the next five after some close matches with the consistent Alec Powell. John Tushingham followed this with three straight wins to get back within shooting distance of Ricky, but to no avail, Alec posted his first win with Ricky in a relaxed third with John going out the way he started with a sixth.

The RC Laser class goes from strength to strength, fifty three skippers took part in this years series, and planning now starts on next years programme which will cover as much of the country as possible. Many new faces have appeared this year and the boat is proving a big attraction for dinghy sailors enjoying their first taste of radio controlled racing.

Overall Results:

PosSail NoHelmClubPts
1st 88 Ricky Tagg Chichester 20 
2nd 311 John Tushingham Keighley 27 
3rd 68 Alec Powell Gosport 43 
4th 184 Tim Davison Yateley 62 
5th 73 Graham Allen Corby 81 

2004 Circuit Winners:

Overall: John Tushingham (Keighley)
Best Newcomer: Alec Powell (Gosport)
Most Improved: John Trimmer (Poole)

With many regional winter series now underway, competition in 2005 is sure to be hot.

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