RC Laser Northern District TT event 4 at Burwain Sailing Club
by Tony Wilson 27 Nov 17:13 GMT
17 November 2019
RC Laser Northern District TT event 4 at Burwain © Tony Wilson
This was number 4 in the Northern Lasers. Rumour was Hugo wouldn't be attending as he had a new addition to the family. Sarah thought otherwise and sacrificed her sailing day to watch over puppy dog corner, while Hugo was still allowed to play with the others and their toy boats.
Light drizzle to start with and a light breeze from either a Northerly or possibly Easterly, so John added enough buoys around the lake to cover all eventualities. Even a leeward gate towards the boat yard in case we had to adopt for a running start, but we got around that one. We were able to sail from the balcony again, but the off centre start/finish line meant Trevor could observe better from the bridge.
Hugo got off to a great start and nailed the first couple of races. John took race 3 and we were now onto just one lap races again, after the first few were taking a while to complete. We were sailing a typical windward leeward course with a spreader at the first mark and all taken to port
Although we had started off in 'A' rig we were soon down a size as you felt it was increasing in strength. Hugo won race four and Tony got in first on race five.
Fran was happy to get one over on Hugo for a first time in beating him, which gave Hugo the idea of bringing out the big sail again just before lunch.
Six races in the bag and after lunch we all went big again. John managed to string a hat trick of three wins and had certainly evened out the odds, but had he gained enough to beat Hugo who had certainly been running good on puppy power.
The last few races had the biggest amount of sail swapping I've ever seen. Ian had both sails waving in his hands and looking like he was signalling some semaphore message for "please help me, which sail shall I use?"
Down to the last race and Trevor decided to make this deciding race a long two lap one as this was the one to win. Hugo would have to win this one, or was it John. If a few of them got tangled up it would all be thrown away. It was all going well and Tony and John had been battling it out right up to the finish line. Tony got in first which allowed John a safe win for the day as Hugo took third spot, but nobody was a hundred percent sure and would there be a count back to who the winner really was.
With John winning the Burwain sail, we have now had four individual winners for this series and there's still two to come, so it is still very much open.
Next sailing will be over at Fleetwood on the 1st December 2019.
Results:
1 John Sharman 18 pts Fleetwood
2 Hugo Chandor 19 pts Burwain
3 Tony Wilson 23 pts Fleetwood