Easter fun and hard work at Lymington Town Sailing Club
by Alastair Beeton 2 Apr 2013 18:26 BST
30-31 March 2013
The Easter weekend saw a buzz of activity at Lymington Town Sailing Club with racing and training taking place. With there being a break from the Early Points Series a number of short, fun races were put together. The idea for this Windward-Leeward series came from Giles Chipperfield and Dave Gorringe who enlisted the help of a number of willing volunteers to pack in some brisk start of season racing with lots of corners and no hanging around.
Sailors were greeted on both days by pleasant, though slightly chilly, conditions. Saturday saw 13 boats making their way to the start line in winds averaging 12 knots. Winds increased slightly for the Sunday racing with a few additional boats swelling that numbers to 18 and the sun shining through the icy air. On each day the Race Officers excelled by hitting exactly the two hours sailing time requested and on Sunday's last race the event ended with the series-leading three boats crossing the line within 6 seconds of each other.
Easter Eggs were awarded to Race Officers Geoff Havers and John Freshwater and to RIB crews Sandy Reid-Peters and Duncan Wright. Eggs were also presented to Kevin Podger in first place, crewed by daughter Hannah and then by Heather Chipperfield, Nick Simmons was second with John Cooper and Becky Wigley coming third. Kevin also won the not-so-congratulatory Easter Egg for the most impressive series of start of season mishaps - quite an achievement considering he won the event as well. The RS Tera fleet were noticeably absent from the Easter races due to some national squad training that was taking place at the club.
The Lymington Town Sailing Club played host to the RS Tera National Squad training weekend. Despite the cold, 25 youngsters from as young as 8yrs old ventured out into the Solent for two full days of hard training. Led by Jonathon Lewis (National Coach) the helms were put through their paces in preparation for the National and World Championships to be held in Weymouth later in the year. All the recent squad events have been at inland venues, the focus this weekend was on sailing in tidal conditions, countering waves and getting the best out of the boats on the sea.
Overlooking the cold, the weather was ideal with a moderate wind on the Saturday, which freshened to an average 17 knots on the Sunday. Saturday saw long sessions, starting with a briefing explaining the aims, then on the water mid morning for a couple of hours of hard sailing. Sailors returned to the club for a quick lunch, a short briefing, before heading back on the water for more training.
After a day on the water the participants had a full debrief where they analysed a video recording of the days sailing. Sunday followed a similar format, except the older sailors in their Tera Pro's were kept on the water for a full day of training. With winds reaching the high teens at times this was a seriously full on day and the youngsters should be congratulated on how well they maintained their concentration and focus for that time.