Two-Boat Team Racing at Royal Gourock Yacht Club
by Peter Collings 4 Jul 2018 17:09 BST
Team racing in Scotland has until now mostly been confined to the winter months, with university students donning drysuits and balaclavas to brave driving snow and frozen lochs. Recently, however, several new events have been established, allowing summer sailors to experience the joys of this format, which is exciting and accessible, to say nothing of the benefit of not needing to provide your own boat.
Royal Gourock Yacht Club, 45 minutes down the Clyde from Glasgow City, was the venue for the first keelboat team racing event of 2018, held in their beautiful fleet of Pipers. The four teams were greeted by near-perfect conditions, a force 3 easterly and glorious sunshine, and in spite of some teething problems getting racing set up, racing was under way soon after 11 on a short windward-leeward course just to the east of the club.
The first race took place between Forza Italia (helmed by proud Italians Emma Fowler and Ben Robertson) and RNCYC (Griogair Whyte and Simon Pender), and in what would become a familiar sight over the next two days, RNCYC sailed into a comfortable lead, before beating Dundaberdeen (Dom Lloyd and Emily Robertson) in the next race, followed by another victory over Team Potato (Peter Collings and Magnus Popplewell). After the first round robin was complete, they had a 100% record, and were looking very impressive, slick team racing manoeuvres consolidating their leads when their impressive boatspeed wasn't quite enough.
The Pipers, with their long, heavy full keels, were proving difficult to adjust to for some of the teams, and there were more than a few red faces as a poorly-judged manoeuvre or mark rounding left a boat dead in the water. However, after a few races, the newer helms were beginning to get the hang of things, and it was only a matter of time before one of them got the better of RNCYC. It took a mistake from Simon Pender at the leeward mark, but Dundaberdeen capitalised expertly to seize a solid 1-2, and open the event right up again, before beating Team Potato to put themselves well in the mix for the lead.
With the heat hitting 27 degrees, a sea breeze was always a possibility, and with the gradient wind coming from the east, the pressure was dropping all day, as the ebb tide strengthened. Combined with the slow tacking speed of the Pipers, this led to some embarrassing moments for the sailors, as the judgement of laylines and mark roundings became crucial to the success of a race.
Eventually, shortly before 4 o'clock, the breeze died almost completely, and the boats slogged back to the moorings for some hard-earned drinks and sunburn assessment. With similar conditions forecast for the next day, and Dundaberdeen having proven that RNCYC were beatable, an exciting conclusion to the event was in prospect.
Sunday dawned even hotter than the previous day, and by 12 o'clock, and only four completed races, racing become impossible, Taps Aff was declared, and the boats moored in the hope that the sea breeze would save us. Unfortunately, the water remained glassy until almost 2PM, and the decision was made to can racing.
At the end of the event, Royal Northern and Clyde Yacht Club ended up as the winners with 7 wins from 8 races, followed by Dundaberdeen (4 wins from 6) and Team Potato (4 wins from 8). A massive thank you to Emily Robertson, Ben Robertson and Griogair Whyte for helping out with the umpiring, and especially to Royal Gourock Yacht Club, without whom the event would never have run. The next team racing event is the RNCYC Keelboat Team Racing Championship in Helensburgh on the 14th and 15th of July, followed by the Scottish 2K Series event at Port Edgar Watersports on the 4th and 5th of August.