NW Senior Travellers at Leigh & Lowton Sailing Club

by Dave Woodhead 18 Sep 2014 08:43 BST 16 September 2014

NW Senior Travellers at Leigh & Lowton © Dave Eccles

The Senior Travellers of the NW region gathered at Leigh and Lowton Sailing Club for round 6 of their mid week series on Tuesday the 16th September. Bright sunshine, warm temperatures and as with all the previous events this year, light winds greeted this friendly bunch of over 50s dinghy sailors.

Twenty three boats competed on the day, bringing the total boats competing in one or more events this year up to fifty seven.

Race one got under way with a long beat to the eastern end of the lake. After a lot of jockeying for position, the recall signal was sounded and several boats from the pin end returned to start again, including Dave Woodhead and Darren Nield in their Solos. As usual, the Merlin of Martin and Rene Watts soon took the lead on the water and also up in the first bunch were Tony Critchley in his Supernova and local sailor Paul Heath in a Solo. However the beat was patchy in pressure and had some significant windshifts. Dave and Darren banged hard left to get clear air after their aborted start and managed to find a port lift and a bit of pressure to bring them back into the game. On the second lap Dave again used the favoured left hand side of the beat to access the port lift and pass Paul Heath who had gone hard right. This time Peter Dewhurst in another Solo followed suit to work himself up into the top bunch. The race eventually went to Dave Woodhead, with Tony critchley second, Peter Dewhurst third, Darren Nield 4th and Paul Heath 5th.

Race two started in even lighter wind. This time Paul Heath made no mistakes, he got the first beat spot on and established a comfortable lead over the other slower boats to take the race on handicap. Second was Darren Nield, third Dave Woodhead, fourth Tony Sampson in another Solo, giving the Solos total domination of the race. Fifth was the Streaker of Dave Turtle.

Several boats were in contention for winning the event as the third race started. A last minute windshift made for a heavy pin end bias, making it difficult to cross the line on starboard. Dave Woodhead and Tony Critchley managed to tack onto port on the start from the pin end and clear the fleet. This gave them first and second at the windward mark, which also became their finishing positions for that race and in the final results on the day. Leaders on the water after the first reach were Martin and Rene in their Merlin and they got third in the race. Fourth place went to the consistent Darren Nield and fifth place went to Paul Hargeaves in a Blaze, his best result of the series so far.

The series reaches its climax with the final round at Elton S C on Tuesday the 7th October. It looks like a two horse race for 1st overall between the two previous winners of the series, Dave Woodhead and Tony Critchley but also up for grabs are trophies for first two man boat, top club and first sailor over 70 (ancient mariner). The full results for the series can be found on the RYA North West region website.

Overall Results:

1 Dave Woodhead, Solo (Elton SC)
2 Tony Critchley, Supernova (Bolton SC)
3 Paul Heath, Solo (Leigh and Lowton SC)
4 Darren Nield, Solo (Elton SC)
5 Martin and Rene Watts, Merlin Rocket (Hollingworth Lake SC)
6 Peter Dewhurst, Solo (Burwain SC)
7 Tony Sampson, Solo (Leigh and Lowton SC)
8 Dave Turtle, Streaker (Shotwick Lake SC)
9 Peter and Judith Baldwin, Enterprise (Redesmere SC)
10 Paul Hargreaves, Blaze (Burwain SC)
11 Jerry Cahill and Ian Beebe, Merlin Rocket (Bolton SC)
12 Roy Woods, Solo (Leigh and Lowton SC)
13 Mark Cuthbert, Supernova (Leigh and Lowton SC)
14 Gerald Whitehead, Solo (Hollingworth lake SC)
15 Mike Broach, Solo (Leigh and Lowton SC)
16 Steve Norris, Phantom (Leigh and Lowton SC)
17 Dave Welch, Solo (Leigh and Lowton SC)
18 George Evans, Streaker (Leigh and Lowton SC)
19 Jeremy Cooper, Laser (Leigh and Lowton SC)
20 Steve Dawson, Phantom (Leigh and Lowton SC)
21 Malcolm Jones, Solo (Elton SC)
22 Ron Goss, Phantom (Burwian SC)
23 Chris Caton, Supernova (Bolton SC)