Salcombe Yacht Club Sailing Club Series Race 4

Saturday 18th May saw the fourth race of the Salcombe Yacht Club Sailing Club Series, a slightly confusing title being a hangover of the amalgamation of the Salcombe Yacht Club and Salcombe Sailing Club in 1964.

Race Officer Simon Dobson made the most of the quite trying conditions, a Force 1-2 SSW light breeze over a flood spring tide, by setting multiple laps of the harbour for all classes. With the Fairway in operation, all boats chose to start off the Portlemouth shore.

With a plethora of youngsters moving up to Laser 4.7s, together with three Aeros, the slower boats struggled to make the tidal gates in a dying breeze, however Clare Booth brought in her Aero 7 in to take the win from the 4.7 of Henry Evans in the Medium Handicap fleet.

It was a clean sweep for the Phantoms, taking the first five places in the Fast Handicap fleet, with Alistair Morley applying his usual personal handicapping system, by starting several minutes behind the main fleet; whilst this has worked successfully in the past, this fast improving fleet saw Paul Ellis take the win from Alistair, with Bruce Hattersley taking a few scalps in third place.

The Solo Class mustered ten starters; no doubt numbers were reduced in anticipation of three days of Open Meeting racing next weekend. David Greening led off the start line and for much of the first lap, with Bill Jago and Simon Yates in pursuit, however Bill picked up more breeze on the beat back through Ditch End to take the lead, and Simon and Ed Stephens moved into second and third, while Greening took a pit stop to reattach a wayward shroud. On the second round of a shortened course the leading three worked the Portlemouth shore, while Greening took a punt to a Salcombe shore finish and overtook Stephens for third place.

In the Yawl fleet, the wisdom of age saw Geoff Gilson and Chris Spencer Chapman pull away from Frank Rowsell and Scratch Hitchin on the Salcombe shore, including a successful traverse of Crab Pots, Stephen Galvin and James Smith rounding off the podium places.

Medium Handicap:

1st Aero 7 1517 Claire Booth
2nd Laser 4.7 180342 Henry Evans

Fast Handicap:

1st Phantom 1413 Paul Ellis
2nd Phantom 1459 Alistair Morley
3rd Phantom 1357 Bruce Hattersley

Solo:

1st 5598 Bill Jago
2nd 5601 Simon Yates
3rd 5792 David Greening

Salcombe Yawl:

1st 170 Geoff Gilson and Chris Spencer Chapman
2nd 185 Scratch Hitchin and Frank Rowsell
3rd 99 Stephen Galvin and James