Bayside Marine South West Topper Traveller at Brixham Yacht Club
by Mark Smith 17 Oct 2019 10:12 BST
13 October 2019
Bayside Marine Brixham Topper Travellers © Mark Smith
Last Sunday saw the final event of the South West Topper Traveller series for 2019 hosted at Brixham Yacht Club and generously sponsored by Bayside Marine Chandlery.
Despite the poor forecast, we still saw a great turn out of 23 keen young sailors all excited for some windy and gusty conditions. As usual, Brixham Yacht Club put on a very professional event officiated by National Race Officer Sean Semmens.
Three of the four planned races were completed with the front of the fleet showing their expert skills in the testing shifty conditions that Torbay threw up. It seemed that the draw of hot chocolate and biscuits on the Mother Boat was too tempting for some of the less experienced sailors at the back of the fleet with numbers of sailors aboard increasing as the day went on. Volunteers in safety boats were kept busy with reefing sails and lots of gybing on the capsize mark!
It was a master class from Ali Holborn from Parkstone, with 3 wins from 3 dominating the event, closely followed by Ollie Freemantle from Poole and Alex Asserati from Castle Cove completing the podium positions.
The event was a resounding success and the sailors were very grateful to receive their pasta supper before prize giving. Dave Thomas from Bayside Marine Chandlery presented the event trophies and some very warm Topper hoodies, Topper T-shirts and the dutiful bags of Haribos!