The weekend 4th & 5th February was successful for Guildford members and also for the designer of their boats, Alex Austin.
On the Saturday Roger went down to Gosport to sail in a Vane 36″ Class event with a new design XITE, which is based on Alex’s successful …CHUN designs namely XASPERACHUN & TAXACHUN. After the 2022 Vane 36″ National Championship at Gosport where the original heavy 1973 XASPERACHUN design finished a creditable 4th out of 9, despite being the oldest boat fleet, this set in motion an idea for a new design for an improved performance. After starting a difficult construction method in September last year, involving grinding away the inside of an existing GRP mould, XITE has just been finished. A pic page of the boat sailing on its trials in January is shown attached. The 4th of February Gosport club event was its first time in competition, so XITE went very well indeed and was unbeaten in light airs, even against one of Gosport’s top team of vane sailors.
The following day Peter and Oliver were at Chipstead for their IOM open. Oliver was given the opportunity of sailing Peter’s world champion BRITPOP, whilst Peter sailed the much older Alex Austin design, ISOTONIC, now well out of fashion in the IOM world. However this is still a very good design and the light and fluky conditions did not stop Peter winning 8 of the 15 races to win the event. Oliver managed to score a 2nd & 4th to finish 10th out of 20, his best result in the class so far…
So, thanks again Alex!
