LDC 2000 Class National Championships at Exe Sailing Club - Day 1
by Chris Jordan 4 Aug 2014 02:49 BST
3-8 August 2014
The fleet of 80 sailors and numerous extra family support have turned up at Exe SC for the 2014 LDC 2000 National Championships. The club officials and the Mayor of Exmouth made the fleet very welcome at the Devon Cream Tea and club welcome – one of the more seasoned competitors said "This was the best welcoming event I have ever attended for a National Championships".
On the first day of the event, Sunday we have had a cracking days sail, a superb start to the week, and a different name at the top of the leader board - what more could you ask for?
Exe SC gave a great briefing for all the competitors - or at least, all bar one who was still stuck on the Ferry from Guernsey! While rigging and lining up to launch, the final boat arrived: and was very quickly put together by the whole fleet. The fleet launched at 11.00 for a gentle sail out of the harbour - expecting 8 knots of wind and bright sunshine all day. The Race Officer (none other than the boat's designer: Phil Morrison) had other ideas - he dialled in 12-15 knots for the first race, and arranged one or two gusts above that for the second race.
The first race started cleanly against a very gentle tidal flow (apart from the boat from Broadstairs who got sent back - NO: it was NOT Dave Adams! This was Chris Thomas, who has obviously been taught by Dave). Crews were on the deck, boats fully powered up, but if you hit a wave wrong on starboard you ended up stopped with a breaker over the front while the other boats around you kept moving. Great surfing conditions downwind allowed Rob and Katie Burridge (Weir Wood SC) to demonstrate great speed down the waves and they took the win at the end of 50 minutes of racing (target time? 50 minutes!) followed very closely by Simon Horsfield and Tom Bernal (Army SA). On the beats, there were shifts coming down the course of between 5 and 20 degrees - tacking on the 5 degree shift was slow in the waves, but if you missed the 20 degree lift 5 boats could get past you!
For the second race, Phil Morrison gave us a double length first beat. After setting a perfect true line, the wind decided to shift right with 2 minutes to go, resulting in a bunch at the right hand end of the line. Many of the top boats started with speed on starboard, and were preparing to hang on until the wind shifted back... Others tacked on port to get clear wind. Half way up the beat, the wind continued to swing to the right by another 20 degrees and picked up a notch in strength! Do we hang on and hope it comes back, or is this a persistent shift and getting across on what is now quite a header is the right thing to do? Around the first mark, Andrew and Susan Cherry having travelled to Exmouth from Dhekelia SC in Cyprus, showed us how to do it correctly. The rest of the fleet were fighting hard to get the right line into the mark, and expecting a very one sided run. However, once all the fleet were safely around the top mark, the wind slipped back to where it should have been and a fairly true gybing run was experienced: Port gybe was very quick, powering down the waves at speed trying not to nose dive too far at the bottom, while starboard gybe resulted in more choices of high and fast or deep and low. Fergus Barnham and Abbie Hewitt (Snettisham Beach SC) got the runs perfect, and pulled out into the lead; being chased by Matt and Clare Sargent (Army SA) up the beats and Natalie and Darren Roach (Royal Navy SA) down the runs.
Once we finished, we then planed back over the bar with kites up at top speed through the water - but barely moving over the land! And the serious business of the Sidmouth Pecker could start. Chris Thomas was very keen to be the first winner of the week: after being the only boat over the line, he lowered his jib while packing the boat up before attaching the forestay: the resulting bang from the mast was enough to awaken the Pecker!
More fun tomorrow. Forecast is for more of the same.
You can find out more details here.