We had a marvellous sail for the first time since the Mermaid in March. The air of expectation was rewarded by sailing DF 95s and we had some really good racing. We tend to forget how exciting it is! Despite only 3 of us wanting to come out to play, we were joined by Leen Buurman of the Hampton Court and Gosport clubs, whose sailing has been restricted by weed and he and his wife Judith enjoyed the day. Mark Mortimore also came over for a chat and to exchange some equipment and he took the photographs that are on the gallery.
We raced a windward leeward course from the southern bank in a WSW shifty 6 -15 mph and completed six two lap races with Martin Crysell winning all of them. The other places were hardfought with a tie for 2nd place, won by Charles Wand Tetley with the tie broken as he beat me in the last race. I thoroughly enjoyed racing my BOTTLE boat with its BF 72 reduced rig, as I rarely race it and mostly lend it to others to sail.
With only a few people sailing, distancing was no problem and we are hoping that there will be more support for the August events from the existing DF 95 fleets. These events will be published shortly on the website.
The results of the racing are attached, but we did sail another couple of races after Martin left and Leen won both of them!
Roger Stollery 2020-07-27
