GP14 National Championships at Largs Sailing Club - Day 1

Dave Young and Nic Booth at the sharp end of the fleet in race 1 of the GP14 nationals © Josh Kerr Photography / www.joshkerrphotography.co.uk

The waiting is over for the best part of 100 GP14 sailors, who have made the trip up to the beautiful west coast of Scotland to sail in the Firth of Clyde off the Ayrshire coastline at Largs SC.

After a briefing on the Saturday evening by the PRO to run through his expectations of the running of the week the competitors, ranging from World, National and Inland champions through to national novices, were ready to go; Line starts was the decision for getting the racing underway, the promise of the "Black Flag" to prevent the "wasting of everybody's time" was a good call. Would the GP fleet, notorious for pushing at any opportunity, behave themselves? Only time would tell.

Forecast for the first day's sailing was a decent breeze, westerly four gusting five, perfect for those who had not lost the weight over the early part of the summer. A practice race was planned for 12.30pm just to give those unfamiliar with nationals starts a quick chance to work out what was going on. Needless to say the black flag was required to keep the fleet at bay, great news for the pair who'd not tallied on who'd had to sail the three miles back to shore to grab their wristbands - Doh!

The traditional practice race was comprehensively "won" by Tom Gillard and Tim Hartley although the four laps signalled by the Race Officer were ignored by the majority of sailors, who were sending out the message that we just wanted to get on with it. After twenty minutes of squally showers and lumpy seas, the race team were ready to rock.

Race 1 (sponsored by Goacher Sails)

The flying of the Blue Peter preparatory was somewhat of a surprise after the practice race experience, the fleet knew they could once again push given the opportunity... The downside for some was the subsequent Black Flag start resulted in six boats being BFDd; unfortunately they were Bronze and Silver fleet sailors who were caught out, finding out they'd not got a result long after completing the 90 minute race.

Leading the way around the race track at the front end were the Goacher driven pair of Ian Dobson & Andy Tunnicliffe followed by two P&B powered hulls of Gillard/Hartley and Dave Young & Nicola Booth. Some of the reaches saw some fantastic GP racing, catching the surf vital in getting the boats around the course at optimum speed. The lead two just sailed away into the distance, by the end almost five minutes ahead of the rest of the fleet, Dobson taking the gun from Gillard after four laps round the triangle/sausage course. Young & Booth had a kite issue on the last leg allowing Shane MacCarthy & Andy Thompson to pop out in third. Lead Silver carrying the disk into day 2 are Ed Dutton and Rich Hales, showing Gold Fleet speed for their second event in a row, brilliant to see. Leading the way in the Bronze fleet are Brian Willis crewed by David McFarland.

Other prizes for the day saw Colin Midgley claim an award for his spectacular death roll just before the practice race; his former crew being on the judging panel suggests some bias on the decision – maybe that's why Justin now helms his own boat! Top Buddy team for the day were "Sugar Candy" with two boats in the top ten – long may their reign continue.

The images used with the report are courtesy of Josh Kerr Photography. Photos of the event will be available from www.joshkerrphotography.co.uk later in the week. The championship committee are also extremely grateful to the sponsors of the Nationals 2013; these being Gul Watersports, Boon, Creation Covers, HD, GingerBoats, Goachers, English Braid, Allen Brothers and Tunnocks.

The forecast for day 2 is a slightly lighter breeze, somewhere between 13 & 18 knots from the north-west, racing once again likely to take place to the north of Great Cumbrae Island with an 11.55 gun.

Results after Day 1: (one race)

More information at scottishsailinginstitute.com/events/gp14-national-championships-2013