3000 Nationals at Draycote Water Sailing Club

by Tony Hunt 3 Oct 2006 12:46 BST 30 September - 1 October 2006

The UK 3000 Class 10th Anniversary Nationals for Laser and Vandercraft 3000’s were held at Draycote Water Sailing Club on the last weekend of September, and also formed the last round of the Phoenix Marine sponsored TT series. The venue lived up fully to the high expectations that hearsay evidence had built up, with comprehensive but friendly on-shore facilities complementing the well-laid windward-leeward courses.

Race 1 was sailed in a good 10 knot breeze finishing in a fine blasting kite reach to the line, and resulted in a clear win for Tony Hunt and Suzanne Hall of Wilsonian SC. Second slot was hotly contested, but in the end Alys Cooper and Emily Sayer of the home club took the honours. Race 2 saw Hunt and Hall having to fight off a challenge from son and father team of Gavin and Peter Macaulay from Queen Mary, who, in the third and final race of the day sailed a faultless race to lead from a perfect start to the finish. Class Chairman Rob Leigh (Leigh & Lowton), crewed by Dave Holliday and sporting his crisp new North sails seized second slot when Hunt threw the place away by miscounting the laps - clearly unsurprising to Leigh who admitted afterwards that he had been unaware of the correct number of laps to be sailed but followed the leader rather than the evidently less-reliable man directly in front of him!

Sunday dawned with a brisk Force 4 under racing low clouds, and in Race 4, Hunt & Hall recovered from being spat out of the back of a start line melee to lead from the first mark on, while the Macaulays fought on several fronts to retain their early second place. In the end, a repeat of the spinnaker problem they’d experienced earlier let a delighted Graham and Ben Blake of Queen Mary and Imogen Westropp and Arian Manouchehri of Killington (Sedburgh School) through into second and third slots. Over the course of the race, the wind had eased, but before the next could be started competitors experienced the quite unique and almost surreal experience of a thundery squall. The RO sensibly decided that the water was not the place for all to be, and with lightning flashing around them, the fleet broad-reached, planing flat-out for the shore across water white from wind and intense, pelting rain. After lunch, there was time for just one more race held in a Force 1-2, which was won by Hunt & Hall from Leigh & Holliday, with Imogen’s brother Henry Westropp and Lee Howson (Killington/Sedburgh) in third.

Overall then, Hunt & Hall took the honours in their Laser 3000, using original Hyde sails, a combination sailed also by the Macaulays in second place. Leigh and Holliday took third overall, and while the North sails of theirs and five other boats seemed to offer a slight edge, especially in the lighter conditions, they could not mask all the other factors that go to determining the race order. While it had been expected that the Vandercraft 3000’s would dominate the event and they did indeed show blistering speed on occasion, their very newness and late arrival at the venue ensured that teething troubles kept them out of the top slots - except when Carsington SC’s Nick Arran sailed his ‘V’ single-handed, thus ‘unofficially’, away from the fleet in the last race, demonstrating that when you effectively remove one-and-a-half persons from the spec of a Laser 3000 it really does go quicker! Although entries were down to 11 boats, this was purely on account of the absence of up to 10 schools’ boats from previous years, and the number of individually-owned boats was the highest for many years; with the advent of the Vandercraft boats which are only just in production and selling well, the class is looking forward to a rosy future.

The TT series result had been open at the start of the weekend, but Matt and Will Archer from Carsington beat the Blakes by two points in the Nationals to secure the Phoenix Marine Travellers Trophy.

Overall Results:

1. 3448 Tony Hunt/Suzanne Hall, 4pts
2. 3254 Gavin & Peter Macaulay, 11pts
3. 3302 Rob Leigh/Dave Holliday, 14pts
4. 3252 Imogen Westropp/Arian Manouchehri, 16pts
5. 3253 Henry Westropp/Lee Howson, 17pts
6. Alys Cooper/Emily Sayer, 19pts