Merlin Rocket Porteous Cup at Tamesis Club

Mike Stephens wins the Porteous and Southcott Cups © John Dunkley

Mike Stephens and Nicky Erskine Tulloch, last year's winners of the Porteous and Southcott Cups for Vintage Merlins, held on to both trophies at Tamesis after the application of handicaps and discards on Saturday 8 October. Sailing Flinkidink (1097), they built up an impressive lead in the final race to finish first on the water as well as on handicap.

Matthew Peregrine Jones and Dana Church had won both the first and second races on the water in Masquerade (995), with Joe and Tom McLaughlin second in Shoestring (3559), but after discarding their worst results in the best two out of three races they dropped to third and second respectively on handicap.

Race Officer Charles Fox set an ideal course for the light WNW breeze with a difficult upstream-downstream dogleg in front of the clubhouse that proved as interesting for spectators sheltering from the cold wind as it was challenging for the 12 competing boats, many of which boosted their progress with spinnakers on the upstream leg.

There were visitors from Upper Thames SC and Hollingworth Lake SC. The prizes were presented by Rebecca McLaughlin.

Richard Howells took several videos of the action:

Start of the first race including recall
Spinnaker run upstream
Close hauled going downstream

Handicap results:

1 Flinkidink (1097) Mike Stephens & Nicky Erskine Tulloch
2 Shoestring (3559) Joe & Tom McLaughlin
3 Masquerade (995) Matthew Peregrine Jones & Dana Church
4 Splatter (1631) Phil Plumtree & Fran Gifford