Hornet Dinghy Exe Sails National Championship 2026 at Shoreham Sailing Club - Day 1
by Gavin Poulloin 29 Aug 20:03 BST
29 August - 1 September 2026
No racing on day 1 of the Hornet Nationals at Shoreham © Gavin Poulloin
All fifteen boats arrived over the Friday with more hope than expectation of sailing today. Most just put their mast up, put the cover back on, and headed for a curry in Shoreham town centre.
Saturday morning dawned, and by the time the William Warren, the race officer for the weekend, started his briefing around 11am, the only change to everyone's boats was the large puddles in the covers from the inevitable wind and rain forecast for the day.
Quite rightly the first comment of the briefing was to abandon the day, and announce 9:55 warning signal on Sunday. With that out the way, the briefing turned out to be on of the longest in recent history.
Luckily the rain eased and the sun made an appearance early afternoon. The whole fleet ventured out for a few hours of rigging and for some, last minute repairs!
By 4pm the wind and rain was back again, with 50 knot gusts reported on Working pier. On writing this, the inevitable sit around talking and drinking is a few rounds in. The quiz planned later in the evening could pull up some heated discussion, and surprise answers.
Fingers crossed the weather window forecast for early Sunday holds and we can get a bit of sailing in, otherwise this could be a long weekend.
Highlights so far are seeing a few locals surfing in Shoreham harbour, Strangler exploiting child labour to help replace his axle on his road base, and as always Dick and Sam trying to fix their boat again!