Haven Series IRC Yacht Racing on the East Coast
by Neale Fuller 22 Oct 2015 17:04 BST
22 October 2015
Blue Beeste won Class 1 in the Haven Series 2015 © Neale Fuller
Just under 30 boats took part in this year's Haven Series IRC Yacht Racing on the East Coast in Dovercourt Bay. With a wide variety of conditions and yachts it made for a competitive 10 race series over the course of the year. Three passage races were also held starting from Harwich Harbour and finishing in Oostende, Ramsgate and Lowestoft.
The points series was largely dominated by the two X-332's, Apex owned by R Legget and Blue Beeste owned by Penfold and Jenkins. K Molls J97 Ickle Jura sailed a consistent series and split the two X Boats, but Blue Beeste had the series wrapped up with a weekend to spare. This allowed N Theodom to come out of racing retirement over race 9 and 10. A little rusty in race 9 but he pulled through in race 10 to add to Blue Beeste's long string of race wins.
Class 2 was a much closer affair with four boats in contention of taking the class win overall in race 9 and 10. This included the Haven Series class chairman Des Cowan's Contessa 33, Eclipse.
The modified Contessa 33 Spirit of Defiance owned by G Parker, T Blake and W Stephens put in a good start to the series and were still within contention along with Aaron Woolf's 707 Rafiki and last year's winners White Lightning, Projection 762.
D Cowans Eclipse put it a good performance in race 9 with a race win closely followed by M, N Fullers and Theobald White Lightning meaning by race 10 it was a simple who beats who to take the series win.
Race 10 bought with it a slightly stronger 12 – 15 knot win which suited F Gooderham's Beneteau 31.7 who took the race win. White Lightning seized the opportunity on the final leg with a tight spinnaker leg in and made up the vital minutes they needed to take the handicap win.
Passage Race 1: Oostende, Belgium
A light northerly wind greeted the 17 strong fleet with 12 making the finish in some very challenging light wind conditions. The Baltic 37 Cosmic Dancer R Walker put in a great performance to take the overall win by over 20 minutes on corrected time. D Cowan's Contessa 33 Eclipse continued their consistent 2nd place form just 6 minutes ahead of R Leggett's X-332 Apex.
Passage Race 2: Ramsgate
A gale warning deterred a majority of the competitors from the Harwich to Ramsgate race but a hardened fleet of 10 boats braved the difficult weather conditions. A strong North wind made the trip exhilarating with a spectacular broach from R Walkers Baltic 37 Cosmic Dancer at the Medusa Buoy.
It was the Sunfast 3200 Amazon owned by T Merewether which prevailed to take the overall win with a comfortable 20 minute cushion on corrected time. The Contessa 26 showed the bigger yachts how it's done coming in just before the biggest boat in the fleet S Fenton's J-120 Blue-J on corrected time.
Passage Race 3: Lowestoft
The Lowestoft race was largely dominated by the larger yachts flying Code Zeros who made it to the beach at Orfordness first escaping the tide and accelerating away towards Lowestoft. I Kirkpatric's X-37 took the biggest advantage from this coming away with the overall win. The Fullers swapped to the family cruising Elan 333 battling through without a code zero to split the bigger boats and took second place followed by Browns Arcona 420 Brave.
Cutler Trophy
The Cutler Trophy was held over race 7 and 8 with each local yacht club entering a team of three yachts. With Walton and Frinton Yacht Club unable to get a team together this left the competition down to Haven Ports Yacht Club against the combined Orwell Yacht Club and Waldringfeild Sailing Club team. Haven Ports with the team including K Moll's J-97 Ickle Jura, R Leggitt's X-332 Apex and J & J Harding's Beneteau First 36.7 Big Wig 2 came away with the overall victory for the second year running.
Full Results can be found at: www.havenseries.org