RS400 Scottish Tour Round 5 at Royal Findhorn Yacht Club

Eight visitors from the far corners of the Scottish RS400 map helped swell the sizeable home fleet of Royal Findhorn over the 4th/5th of July, for the 5th event of the RS400 Scottish Tour. With a good forecast for the day, the fleet was itching to get out onto the Moray Firth to carry on with the latest round of the tour which so far this year has been a bit meteorologically challenged.

Race 1 – All the eager beavers were lined up at the biased stbd end of the line with Sinclair / Wilcox being a bit too eager, and requiring to head back to re-cross. Bedborough / Spacey sparkled off into the distance to take the race win comfortably. Jim fighting back valiantly to take 2nd place recovering strongly through the fleet, passing Yeamans / McMinn on the last run who held onto 3rd.

Race 2 – Again the bias on the line proved a bit too much excitement for some at the start, with the fleet pushing significantly over the line for a general recall. Some will be glad of such, especially with Britton / McCulloch attempting and narrowly avoiding a hefty barge to force their way in, luck rather than judgement saving Ellis / Ellis from having a raiding party by "The Black Pearl." Second time lucky and Britton / McCulloch seemed to make amends for their previous start and led the fleet round the windward mark. Unfortunately this was short lived after getting lost on the windward / leeward course, and relinquished the lead to Yeamans / McMinn by the second mark. Sinclair / Wilcox again showed their tenacity to battle past the leading boats to take the win, followed by a rapid Bedborough / Spacey. Yeamans / McMinn holding onto 3rdafter a tight battle with MacKenzie / Box.

Race 3 – With a wind change forcing a small postponement, race 3 got under way just after the turn of the tide. Again Bedborough / Spacey were the pace setters, but got caught out with a wind shift down the first run and dropped back to 3rd by the leeward mark. The race had now become a drag race with the course being a fetch reach, and sensibly the race officer shortened the course to two laps. MacKenzie / Box ended up being the leaders of the procession to take the win, followed by Bedborough / Spacey in 2nd recovering back to 2nd and Yeamans / McMinn in 3rd.

End of day one and the now infamous slog back through the outgoing tide from the bay. Several of the boats having to resort to the old cheat of climbing out and pulling the boat along the shore against the current.

Sunday dawned with a few fuzzy heads from the late night in the clubhouse bar, but relieved with the late kick off due to the tidal situation. Two local boats including the newly crowned Scottish champions Urquhart twins decided to come and play. Just as the fleet was assembling to launch the haar kicked in, reducing the visibility to only a few hundred metres. Sailing in the bay it is then. The run down to the new course catching a few unawares with the reduced water depth over the sand bars. One 29er showing how not to do it by pitchpoling after collecting their daggerboard on the sand.

Race 4 – After the delay of waiting for sufficient water to enter the bay and for the visibility to improve, the fleet got away cleanly on a much less biased line from the previous day. The usual suspects all converged on the windward mark, with local sailors Ellis / Ellis, Munro / Harris & Urquhart / Urquhart showing what local knowledge can do. With the front runners heading left down the run, Yeamans / McMinn headed right, and ended up sneaking past the leading group to take the lead. This was held for almost all the remainder of the race until Bedborough with local master tactician Gary Rendall-Cowell (of Britain's got talent fame) standing in for Spacey, snatched the win with a last gasp dash for the line, and winning by a poles length. Urquhart / Urquhart finishing 3rd.

Race 5 – A small re-laying of the windward mark, and we were off again. This time Ellis / Ellis came out of the box quickest, showing the fleet a clean pair of heels, with even Bedborough / Simon Cowell being unable to catch them. Munro / Harris lead a tightly bunched group in to 3rd place for their best result of the weekend.

Race 6 – Showing a bit of compassion to the fleet, Bedborough/ Cowell decided to sit the last race out with some gin on Simon's yacht, and let the rest of the fleet battle it out. As with the previous day, the third race coincided with the turning of the tide. This made things a bit more interesting over the course with the currents running in different directions over the sand bars. From the start it looked like the left hand side paid off, following the route of the river up the shoreline, with the top three boats all coming in from the port lay line. However, the top 6 was tightly grouped and places were swapping constantly upwind and down. MacKenzie / Box managed to keep on top throughout the race, collecting their second win of the series, with Ellis / Ellis finishing 2nd and Urquhart / Urquhart 3rd.

Following the first full weekends racing of the year, the sailing honours went to Bedborough / Spacey+Cowell, with MacKenzie / Box 2nd and Yeamans / McMinn 3rd.

Onto the real competition and the awarding of the 'duckhams' for the Stewart Browning Trophy awarded for monumental cockup or noteable sporting endeavour. Phil Britton always leading the charge with some lack of navigational awareness, forcing Dave Webley to respond with a 6.0 dive off his boat, losing his fabled hat in the process. Jim Sinclair being unable to compete with this decided to head home early and missed a great days racing. A late charge on the second day from Bob Yeamans who in a post-race red-mist moment decided to destruction test his mainsheet jammer and promptly fell out the boat leaving newly-engaged fiancé Nadia with a difficult deicison whether to head back for him or not. However this was still not enough to beat local fleet captain Martin Slack allowing his son to marry on the day of his home regatta meaning he missed all the fun!

Overall Results: