A Busy Weekend For Gunfleet

On the Sunday 17 Gunfleet boats sailed up to Holland Haven to join Clacton Sailing Club in their Regatta.  Eleven Gunfleet dinghies entered the morning race, for the RNLI Pennants and took the top four spots in the Monohull section:

 and the top five spots in the Cadet section:

 

The previous Wednesday evening eleven boats entered the final race in Gunfleet’s Summer Series in a light westerly wind and a low, ebbing tide.  The fleet buzzed up and down the line, staying very close to the shore, with the early evening sun lighting-up their sails.  Paul Davis proved to be a little too eager in his Solution and found himself just the wrong side of the line at the start, but before the individual recall flag reached the top of the yardarm he had returned and corrected his error.  Starting close to the Inner Distance Mark the competitors all tried to make the Eastcliff buoy in one tack but a number found they couldn’t point quite that high and were forced to put an additional small tack in.  There then followed a broad reach out to the Seaward mark, a gybe round the buoy and a fetch into the AWS mark.  The sailors then headed back out to sea before reaching down to the Kingscliff buoy and beating back through the line.  At the end of the first lap John Tappenden was first in his Blaze, Ken Potts was lying second in his RS600 and Peter Downer was third in his Comet.  However, during the second lap a dark cloud came over and a small squall hit the fleet causing a number of capsizes.  This, coupled with a wind-shift, resulted in several places changing and it was Davis that made up for his bad start to take the winning gun, with Downer second and Tappenden having to content himself with third place.  This slight drop in his position in the last race did not impact on Tappenden’s overall victory in the series.