Impala 28 Europeans at the Royal Southern Yacht Club

Hosted by the Royal Southern Yacht Club the Impala European Championships attracted entries from across the U.K. and Ireland. The regatta consisted of seven races, two a day except on Thursday when the fleet sailed a longer race.

Tuesday’s races were sailed in strong SW’erly breezes. The mean wind speed was 30 kts and, before their Windex was blown off the top of the mast, the crew on Ruffian recorded a gust of 42 kts. For the morning race all but the first two boats home sailed with reefed mains. Due to a technical problem with his mainsail Robert Leggett in Monkey Business (8589) started the race with no main and still managed to come to the windward mark in 2nd place. The afternoon race turned into a war of attrition and half the fleet retired rather than suffer major damage.

By Wednesday morning the weather had moderated and the previous day’s woes had been repaired. Sean & Tania Semmens sailing Impulsive (9594) added another win to their two wins on Day 1 but the rest of the fleet were close behind and their lead was never decisive. In the afternoon Jules Hall, Rob Garlick & Will Hamilton on Disko Trooper (9610) beat Malcolm Hutchings sailing Reaction (9614) by 2 secs and the last boat home was less than 2 mins behind the winner. The long distance race on Thursday could not be discarded from each boat’s overall score. There was a short delay to the start when a late wind shift required the start line to be moved. The course then took the fleet to the Eastern Solent and after just under 5 hrs of racing Impulsive won their 4th race of the week.

In the final day’s two short races Impulsive completed a clean sweep with two more victories. However the battle by the next five boats for the minor places went to the last race when Reaction's 3rd place ahead of Philip Meakin’s Polly was enough to give them 3rd place overall behind Impulsive & Disko Trooper.

Overall Results: