Salcombe Yacht Club Bucket and Spade Series - Races 4 & 5, Sea Races
by Lucy Burn 30 Aug 07:15 BST
27 August 2022
Saturday the 27th saw Race Officer David Greening take charge once again of the ever popular Bucket and Spade Series Sea Races.
Taking place out on The Range, the format would consist of 2 back to back races with a target time of approximately 45-60 minutes for each race. The course would be a windward and a leeward mark, each to be rounded to port.
The 19 strong Handicap fleet was made up of 14 Solos, 1 Merlin Rocket, a 505, an Albacore and 2 Laser radials.
In the first race it was the Solos who filled the top spots. Graham Cranford-Smith just loosing out to Roger Guess who won the first race with Robin Hodges finishing 3rd.
In the second race it was the turn of the faster boats to take the top two places. Frances Gifford and Fiona Cranford-Smith in the Merlin Rocket took the win with a sizeable margin over Peter Colclough and crew in the 505 who finished second. Our very own commodore Simon Dobson who after a tough first race had a much better time of it in the second race finished 3rd in his Solo.
Taking the overall win for the series was Simon Yates in his Solo.
The Yawl fleet saw the largest turn out of the series with 13 boats heading out to sea for the racing.
The first race was won by Will and Mandy Henderson who led from start to finish with Phil King and John Sleep in 2nd. Andrew Wood and Tim Petit sailing Black Betty finished 3rd and were the first blue fleet Yawl.
The second race, another Henderson master class saw them out front for the entire race once again adding yet another win to their long list of victories. Phil and John were once again 2nd but this time they had to share second place with Andrew and Tim who on corrected time had exactly the same finish time.
Taking the overall win for the series though was father and son team John and Frankie Burn.
Thank you to everyone involved in running the sea racing, especially Andrew Reed who very kindly provided the committee boat.