Kleinwort Benson Poole Yacht Club Regatta

The Jubilee weekend saw the yacht clubs of Poole combining to host their second regatta for keelboats, sponsored by Kleinwort Benson. This is now a biennial event and already thoughts are on future years.

There were three starting areas. In Poole Bay two courses were laid for the larger boats whilst inside the Harbour, where the smaller boats were protected from the vagaries of an English summer, a further course was laid. The winds which varied in strength from force 6 to zilch and in direction from SE to SW provided a full range of sea conditions in the Bay. No-one could complain that they did not have their favourite conditions at least sometime or the other

The two IRC classes enjoyed some close racing. In the larger group the Swan 44 of Harry Evans and the Elan of Jim Macgregor, the local lads, were battling with Shaun Frolich a visitor to the area with his X332. Not far behind them came Martin Pearson on Ruthless and Christine Simpson with Eye Eye.

The smaller IRC boats also had good racing with the race winners flags being shared between Glyn Deakin on a Fun, Ian Foster on a Bolero and John Whittle with his Sigma 33. Ian Foster sailed well in strong winds on the last day to take the class from Gerry Baxter on his MG27.

Starts were provided for the J24’s and the Sonata classes both of which were holding their Southern Area Championships. The XOD class joined them in racing outside.

Inside the Harbour there was only one handicap class, all local boats, the others being one class boats. The Redwings were the largest and most colourful of these with the flying fifteen’s and the 2.4’s making up in enthusiasm for their lack of size.

The prizes were presented to the winners by Ben Ainslie in front of a large and happy crowd.

Overall Results: