RS Elite Pennant Weekend at Hayling Island Sailing Club

With a fruity forecast and a solid 20/25 knots of south westerly breeze coupled with wind over tide in the Harbour entrance, Race Officer Adrian King decided to run racing inside the Harbour rather than outside in Hayling Bay.

While The Doctor (46 – Pete Copsey, Max Sparks and Wayne Rogers) and Galadrial (29 – Jamie Muir, Gary Bettesworth and Mark Nethercleft) galloped into an unassailable lead across the Winner Bank via Dunes to the weather mark, the rest of the fleet experienced navigation failure by mistakenly following each other to the Solo Class wing mark before realising their error and reaching back to the correct mark. The Doctor in first place and Galadrial in second, held their lead over the chasing pack with Lazy Daisy (6 – Andy and Karen Partington and Gareth Edwards) following up in a distant third.

Aeolus (11 – Ossie Stewart, Tom Stewart and Mitch Webb) timed the start of Race 2 to perfection winning the pin end of the line, leaving the fleet floundering in their wake. The Doctor once again galloped off across the Winner Bank with Legs Eleven (11 – Paul and Caroline Fisk and Martin Grady) in hot pursuit only to find that the weather mark had been moved to where the wing mark was in Race 1! By now, Aeolus had rounded first with Wombat (55 – Russell Peters, Susy Peters and Greg Wells) in second and Lazy Daisy once again third. On a one-sided course and little opportunity for overtaking, the leaderboard remained unchanged to the finish.

Saturday's racing out of the way, attention turned to the Rio themed Summer Ball with the Elite fleet rollicking their way around the dance floor. A grey, damp Sunday morning reflected many of the competitors' hangovers as, once again, racing was moved inside the Harbour to the Itchenor channel. Whilst the restricted space meant the Elites could find their way to the weather mark without getting lost, an up-tide beat in the 20/25 knot south westerly resulted in several boats pushing the edges of the race track in search of the bottom. Dirty Dozen (12 – Tim Peters, Andrew Jameson and James Grant) showed some blistering pace upwind to overhaul both Shaken Not Stirred (7 – Colin Smith, Jamie Smith and Lucy visiting from Tasmania) and Legs Eleven to win Race 3 in a nail-biting three-way finish.

So, with one race to go and a discard yet to be applied, any one of five boats could win the four-race series. Wombat were leading on 10 points from Dirty Dozen and Lazy Daisy tied in second on 11, Legs Eleven in fourth on 13 points and Aeolus (who overnight had swapped Mitch Webb for Bill Masterman) in fifth on 15 points. Whilst other contenders' challenges faltered with groundings, weed on keels and spinnaker trawling, Aeolus held their nerve to win Race 4 from Shaken Not Stirred and Dirty Dozen.

At the end of an error-strewn weekend, Aeolus emerged as the series winner on eight points counting two race wins and a sixth place, from Dirty Dozen, also on eight points (1, 3, 4) in second place and Wombat on ten points (4,2,4) in third place overall.

Many thanks to Race Officer Adrian King and team for some creative race management in difficult circumstances. The Sundowner Thursday evening series continues this week with the next Sprint Racing set for Saturday 23 July.

Overall Results: