Nordic Folkboat National Championships at Royal Lymington Yacht Club

Crackerjack takes the 2018 Nordic National Championships!

Firstly, many thanks to the Race Officer, Simon van de Byl and his team of volunteers for brilliantly running the Nordic National Championships based from the Royal Lymington Yacht Club, over a weekend of glorious Nordic weather. Who could have asked for better conditions!

After some gentle encouragement from our Class Captain, 17 boats, three from Yarmouth, The Otter, Eala and Njord, entered for the Nationals. Saturday dawned sunny with a light westerly, somewhat shifty breeze of approx. 8-10 knots. A short windward leeward race got us into the mood with the first three places going to Cream Cracker, Niel Martin our visitor from the Royal Anglesey Yacht Club, second Padfoot and third Tak.

A slightly longer round the cans race followed in similar conditions, was won by Crackerjack, from Tak and Padfoot.

The final race of the day with 10-12 knots, was a longer windward leeward race won by Tak, from Crackerjack and Cream Cracker, therefore completing our three races for the first day.

Sunday dawned with a forecast of a 12-16 knots South Westerly breeze overcast but with sun expected later.

The PRO decided to run longer length races for the fourth and fifth windward-leeward. After some extremely interesting even dangerous starting techniques from some of the fleet, as well as over enthusiasm from the rest, there was a general recall. The Z, penalty flag was flown and the fleet got away cleanly. A one sided beat, up the shore out of the tide to the first mark followed, with the wind shifting to and fro. Tak won this race from Padfoot, and Crackerjack with Cream Cracker fourth.

For the second race, with some further poor lack of rule adherence at the start and under a Z flag, we had another right side race up the mainland shore avoiding the still flooding tide before judging the tack to the weather mark to the South in more tide. The likely suspects, Crackerjack and Padfoot got away, but closely followed this time by Mistral, Tak and Cream Cracker finishing in this order.

With Tak and Crackerjack each having two wins, the final result came down to the wire, but with Crackerjack winning the last race Appendix A, 8.2 prevailed giving them the win. Great credit goes to Tak with a total crew age of 235 years! There is hope for us all yet! Congratulations go to the overall winner of the Championship, Crackerjack closely fought from Tak and Padfoot, both sailing very consistently, as well as our visitor Cream Cracker fourth, Mistral fifth and The Otter sixth. A good time and regatta was had by all.

Overall Results:
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