Royal Southampton Yacht Club 2011 Prizegiving

Tina Scott presents the prizes at the Royal Southampton Yacht Club prizegiving © Mike Ford

Racers, crew, friends and family gathered for this year's Royal Southampton Yacht Club prizegiving and party at the Ocean Village Clubhouse at 7.30 PM on Saturday 10th December.

We were proud and delighted to have Tina Scott, XOD Class Secretary and winner of this year's AAM Cowes Week Ladies Day trophy, as our guest to award the trophies.

Whether they collected any silverware or not, everyone present had a great time reflecting on the season just past and looking forward to what the next year of sailing will bring the Doyle Sails Frostbite Series starts on 8th January 2012 when we are expecting more close racing and renewed rivalries.

The 2011 Frostbite Series blew out the festive cobwebs with strong blustery SW winds. The frosts returned for the February races and ended in March with bright sunshine. Cascading up and down Southampton Water, the fleets saw really close racing.

Frostbite Series Results:

Class 1 IRC, J Dream, David & Kirsty Apthorp
Class 2 IRC, J’ronimo, David Greenhalgh
Class 3 RSYC, Briso-Vader, Doug Innes
Class 4 RSYC, Little Spirit, Brian Cooper

The Spring Series, an 8-race series in March and April, was unseasonably warm and the winds, particularly towards the end of the Series, were light. As is often the case, the Series was only decided on the last race.

Spring Series Results:

Class 1, Jammin, Andrew Campbell
Class 2, Glass Onion, Jason Mackenzie

The 2011 Clarkson Cup was RSYC’s premier IRC event and the first outing for the IRC Solent Series. The three-race Regatta in mid-May saw almost perfect sailing conditions on Southampton Water with a gently building NW to WNW breeze.

Clarkson Cup Results:

Class 1, Banshee, Lance Adams
Class 2, High Tension, Andrew Given
Class 3, Mongoose, Tom Snowball
Class 4, Eskymo, David Cowell

Twilight Series, raced on Thursday evenings, was supported by Portmore Insurance, who paid to brand two racing marks this year. In 2011, racing was slipped to start at 7pm to enable more Club members to reach the start line. The Class 2 ‘Hound Trophy’ was won for the third time running by Ian Townend and John Cooper.

Twilight Series Results:

Class 1 J Arrow, Mike Garvey
Class 2 Tigerfeet, Ian Townend/John Cooper

Every two years, Royal Southampton hosts the Biscay Challenge, a unique Double Handed event, from the Solent to Biscay. This year’s sponsor was Bank of New York Mellon. The race was scheduled to start on 18 June, but the solid 40-45 knot winds meant a 24 hour delay. The poor conditions led to a very uncomfortable Channel. The winner, who also won the 2009 Biscay Challenge, could not make RSYC’s dedicated double handed prize giving in October, so collected ‘the Voyager Trophy’ at last night’s event.

Biscay Challenge Results:

Overall Winner, Only Just, Andy Hill/Mathieu Lathoud

2011 is the Centenary of the X One Design Class and RSYC were proud to host two events, the XOD Central Solent Championship and XOD Centenary Championship.

The Central Solent event was a regatta of five races over the weekend 22-24 July – a perfect practice for Cowes Week. The overall winner did not take a first place, but their consistent standard of racing was enough to secure the overall trophy.

XOD Central Solent Championship Results:

Overall Winner, Swallow, Simon Russell/Darren Maple

The first event of the XOD weekend was the standalone race for the Hythe Cup to commemorate and emulate the very first contest 100 years ago. The race attracted entries from the Hamble, Itchenor, Lymington and Yarmouth divisions. In 2011, as then, the race started at Netley buoy and finished near Hythe. There were some real battles around the marks in shifting winds and the winner finished with a lead of just 25 seconds.

XOD Centenary Championships Results:

Overall winner, La Mouette, Ken Williamson

RSYC’s Summer Series, held on Thursday evenings, saw unseasonable weather with few sea breezes and more variable conditions.

Summer Series Results:

Class 1 Mistral, Mark Baskerville
Class 2 Ex Tip, Cuan Marsh

Royal Southampton is one of three Royal Clubs that run the racing on the first three days of the Aberdeen Asset Management Cowes Week. The three Clubs also take turns to provide a Principal Race Officer for those three days and each PRO serves for two years. RSYC’s David Giddings has just completed his two years as PRO and the Club thanked him for the extra time, hard work and leadership he had provided during his tenure.

Cowes Week this year saw some particularly rough conditions and on the Sunday even the stalwart XODs agreed that discretion was the better part of valour and their racing was abandoned that day.

Cowes Week Results:

Black Group
Class 0 IRC, Bob, Sam Laidlaw
Class 1 IRC, Codium, Bruno Letellier
Class 2 IRC, Jinja, Ian Richard Matthews
Class 3 IRC, Fat Jax. Iain Kirkpatrick
Class 4 IRC, Stilletto, Paul Woodward
Class 5 IRC, Winsome, Boj Mirk
Class 6 IRC, Simplicity, Rory Fitzwilliams
Class 7 IRC, Growling Kougar, Simon Judge
IRC Big Boats, Ran, Robert Swann
Sigma 33, Workout, Jeff Worboys
Sigma 38, Mefisto, Kevin Sussmilch
On Deck 60, Spirit of Juno, Juan Coetzer
Quarter ton, Whiskers, Liz Rushall
IRC rating system, Panther, James Stableford
J/109, Velvet Elvis, Martin Miller
Multihulls, Buzz, Phil Cotton
Sunsail, Casenove Absolute, Pippa Hare

White Group
RS Elite, RSSailing.com, Martin Wadhams
J/80, Spirfire, Tony Hanlon
Sonar, Bertie, Simon Barter
Laser SB3, Red Rocket, Nicholas Thompson
First 40.7, Tradion Philosophie IV, Nicolas Gaumont-Prat
Daring, Dauntless, Giles Peckham
Dragon, Aimee, Graham Bailey
Etchell, Freelance, Laurence Mead

The next event in the RSYC fully crewed calendar was the annual fundraising race to Yarmouth. After the strong winds of June, July and August, we were blessed with the first of calmer Autumn weather. At a fundraising dinner at the Royal Solent, we handed over a cheque to the RNLI of more than £2,000.

RNLI Fundraising race to Yarmouth Results:

Class 3 Shades of Blue, Ed Holton
Class 4 Salamander, Juan Moreno

The Winter Series marks RSYC’s return to Sunday morning racing on Southampton Water, and finished just two weeks ago. The Series was remarkable for the close racing, good sailing breezes and generally mild conditions.

Winter Series Results:

Class 1 Jammin, Ian Townend/John Cooper
Class 2 White Heather, Lionel/Janet Miller

The last race of the RSYC year is the Charity Pursuit race in support of the Commodore’s charity. For the next two years RSYC will be supporting Toe in the Water, dedicated to re-inspiring injured servicepeople through competitive sailing.

Charity Pursuit Results:

Class 3 Pamina, Anthony Woolley
Class 4 Spitfire, Tony Hanlon

Three special prizes were awarded:

For Club Merit, the Half Nelson Trophy was awarded to Ginny Bennett, who has entered more than 120 races since 2002.

The Wanderer Trophy is awarded to a club Member for an amateur or professional long distance venture of any duration over the last 12-18 months. In 2011 it was awarded to Andy/Cerize Gay, who circumnavigated the UK on their motorboat Capeseal.

The Award for Achievement, Commitment and Effort (ACE) was awarded to Roger Townsend, for his work as Race Director, Biscay Challenge.

RSYC is planning a full schedule of fully crewed and double-handed events during 2012. The Club is also hosting the J Class Solent Regatta in July 2012, when the largest fleet of these magnificent boats are expected to race in the Central Solent. More details on the website - www.rsyc.org.uk