Greene King Crouch Roach Race
by Phillip Harbott 18 Aug 2013 23:08 BST
18 August 2013
Crouch Roach Race © John Pawley
The Crouch Yacht Club hosted the Crouch Roach Race today for the Greene King Trophy for IRC and Crouch Roach Salver for all on a local handicap system. Four boats entered and all opted to head up river first to Short Pole Reach against the start of the ebb tide. Inn Spirit got the best start, with Just Is the J 95 owned by Frank Curtis and Carole Pickett following hard on their heels. Double Trouble, the SJ320 was right in the mix in the pre start jostling, but stalled at the start, and was a little slow to get going. Sapphire, the Dehler opting to sail on her non spinnaker IRC had a few problems, and was OCS at the start, but quickly corrected this, starting a couple of minutes behind the rest of the fleet.
Double Trouble owned and sailed by Duncan Haley managed to get through the slightly higher rated Just Is on the beat up to Short Pole Reach, and had, for some time stayed with the much higher rated Inn Spirit, owned by Alan Bartlett. As the tide increased in strength, the water line advantage held by Inn Spirit meant that she increased her on the water lead, and once round Short Pole Reach flew away from the rest of the fleet with tidal advantage and a huge AP kite. Duncan Haley was next to appear on the down tide leg in Double Trouble, with Just Is following. Sapphire were some distance behind as sailing without a spinnaker on the run; fortunately a with tide leg.
Double Trouble retired and motored up river and Inn Spirit were then in sight, beating towards the finish line. Just before they finished, Sapphire crossed the line on her way down the round Roach buoy in the river Roach. Just Is finished next, but were unable to save their time on Inn Spirit. Sapphire finished third and the on the water positions were also the corrected time positions.
At the prize giving, Brenda Cashel presented both the Greene King IRC Trophy and the Crouch Roach Salver to Alan Bartlett from Inn Spirit. Next week, Burnham Week is on, with 8 days of racing and great social events in the evenings. More details at www.burnhamweek.org.uk