RS400 Inland Championship 2025 at Grafham Water Sailing Club

RS400 Inland Championship at Grafham © Lizzie Cattermole

Storm Amy decided she had other plans making the RS400 Inland Championship not quite the usual event. When most decided to make the wise choice to stay warm inside or off on Endeavour duties, five brave RS400s made the trip to Grafham Water Sailing Club to take on the strong winds.

The PRO John Aston had already made the decision to cancel Saturday's racing on Friday morning, after forecasts reporting gusts well into the 40s. This decision was later validated when the club weather station was recording 32 knots gusting 40 on Saturday morning. This gave travellers a slightly more leisurely start to get rigged up ready for 4 back to back races on Sunday.

As Sunday begun, the wind was seemingly manageable. On the drive to the club, the trees seemed alright, but this was just a false sense of security. Rigging was also generally okay, with the water being relatively flat, despite having a long fetch with the direction coming down the lake. It wasn't until launching around 10 when Storm Amy thought it was ready to surprise us.

All five boats got out to the start line, presented with white horses, despite the course being as close to the shore as possible. Luckily John Aston didn't keep us hanging around and got the racing under way quickly. With the 800s going first, we could see how they got on with the conditions but the amount of swimming didn't give us the confidence we were hoping for.

As the racing got under way, the wind kept going up and down in spikes. At points, the lake was completely covered in white horses, and other moments seemed somewhat manageable. Sam and Chris made it first round the windward mark (which became a trend for the day). Getting the kite up was also a bit of a false sense of security. Being closer to the shore with the hills and trees made it all feel nice and calm, usually coming to an end around the point you wanted to gybe, which a few discovered the hard way.

Sadly Ben and Finn's spinnaker pole decided it wanted independence and ended their day early.

Going into the later races, we had lost count on the capsizes but it was great to see people giving it a crack. After race 2, the race officer asked if people were interested in all four races, but the general consensus was three would be plenty, especially as Sam and Chris were giving us a master class in storm sailing.

A notable moment was the finish of Race 2 for Will and Natalie as they came flying into the finish, trying their hardest to not crash into the committee boat while going full speed.

Thanks to Grafham Water Sailing Club for hosting yet another inland championships, we look forward to returning in the future with hopefully better weather! Thank you to Rooster for sponsoring the National Tour and providing our brave sailors with some nice prizes!

The next event is the Pitsford Finale, our final event and the overall prize-giving of the Rooster National Tour.

Overall Results:

Sam Knight and Chris Bownes win the RS400 Inland Championship at Grafham - photo © Lizzie Cattermole