News & Reports

2018 Vane A Class Nationals Update

Update from Roger: our young member CJ Vice was in the top 6 on Monday night. This is quite remarkable as it is a great credit to him albeit with help from his dad. On Monday he out sailed Graham Bantock on the bank with a perfect re-trim and did the same on the run against Lester Gilbert on the run to take the 5 points. We also have Brillie Vice sailing with Zak Roberts and thoroughly enjoying his first taste of vane racing and our member from Holland, Arjan Van de Cingel sailing with his son Eric.
For me as Race Officer it was a great delight to see the Clockwork Orange going so well in its 47th year. When it first came out in 1971 it was a revolutionary lightweight by not being 50-60lb but only 36lb with only two thirds of normal sail area. Now it is one of the heavyweights with the lightest competitors being 18lb, and next lightest 27lb and the norm being 33lb. At that time the stalwarts of the class didn’t like this, nor its round sections with no flat deck, nor its double sails, nor its wing mast and probably most of all its bright orange all over colour. Now it stands out looking the most modern, as it doesn’t have horrid deck patches and its shape is not distorted by the rule that was devised at that time specifically to ban the Clockwork Orange.
Best Roger
By |2018-08-02T21:53:02+01:00August 2nd, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on 2018 Vane A Class Nationals Update
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Vane A class Nationals Latest News

Roger has just returned form Gosport after the first 2 days as RO.
“After all the recent good weather Sunday’s was appalling with heavy rain all day and blowing a gale from the south giving reaching conditions both up and down the lake.. Monday had the same wind direction, but much lighter with all in top suits. 6 young skippers/mates were thoroughly enjoying both the conditions.  Even younger sailors competed in the Choppa race at lunchtime, where these 12” boats with no steering raced the same course with the winner nearly reaching the end before hitting the side.
Cheers Roger
Clockwork Orange

Photo shows the 47 year old Clockwork Orange in tiny 3rd suit sails by Guildford member, teenager CJ Vice  racing the Sunday leader, Robert Bell sailing a 27lb ‘Lightning’ in second suit. Photo taken by Gillian Pearson.

Vane A Class Nationals 2018

Photo shows their start and the wet and bedragled participants. Photo taken by Gillian Pearson.

Vane A Class Nationals 2018

Photo shows Graham Butler and Graham Bantock trying to prevent their boats hitting the bank after a collision – this was re-sailed. Photo taken by Gillian Pearson.

Choppa Race

Photo shows the start of the Choppa race and 5 very excited children. Photo taken By Roger Stollery.

Vane A Results Monday 30 July 2018

Vane A Results Monday 30 July 2018

By |2018-08-02T21:48:39+01:00August 2nd, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on Vane A class Nationals Latest News
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Canadian Visitor John Ball Visits Abbey Meads

Dear All,

Martin, Alan, Peter and myself welcomed our Canadian visitor, John Ball to Abbey Meads on Sunday on an incredibly hot day, with a light and variable northerly wind. It was almost too hot in the full sun, but Alan brought his umbrella which gave a

Martin Crysell & Peter Dunne at Arcadia 2018

Martin Crysell & Peter Dunne at Arcadia 2018

little shade in the morning shared by as many of us who could cram underneath it, when we were not racing. John is used to sailing IOMs and so it made a change to sail my UP.

The last time he sailed a Marblehead in the UK was at the first Marblehead International in 1975 at Gosport. Then he sailed a Chris Dicks design PTERODACTYL into second place and beat all the UK skippers, just as he did on Sunday!
Arcadia June 2018

Arcadia June 2018

Attached are some photo’s recording the events of the day, but not the presentation of the Arcadia Trophy, which was not available to present. At least a photograph of the trophy is shown below. This is a trophy competed for on merit and John showed his skill in sailing on Abbey Meads with the very variable wind to win the event.
John Ball, Alan Viney, Roger Stollery, Peter Dunne & Martin Crysell.

John Ball, Alan Viney, Roger Stollery, Peter Dunne & Martin Crysell.

Peter Dunne presented with June's MEMBERS Trophy, by Alan Viney

Peter Dunne presented with Junes MEMBERS Trophy, by Alan Viney

Apart from the disappointing wind, there were loose strands of weed picked up by every boat in every race and this problem, presumably accelerated by the hot weather has arrived a lot earlier than its normal appearance in the early autumn and casts doubt on the running of our ALE series from now on.

Arcadia Tropy

Arcadia Trophy

The committee will make a decision on this just prior to the next ALE event on Wednesday, 19 July.
Cheers, Roger
By |2018-07-15T22:58:30+01:00July 10th, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on Canadian Visitor John Ball Visits Abbey Meads
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Wednesday’s ALE Event on 4 July is Definitely On

Dear All,
For once GMYC can be positive about this Wednesday’s ALE event, which is definitely on and we look forward to a good response and a good turnout. The forecast is looking good with northerly winds, which is one of the best directions on our Abbey Meads Lake, blowing straight down the middle. So please come have some fun between 2 and 5 PM. As there is no doubt about the running of this event, there is no need to ring Roger on the morning of the event.
We look forward to seeing you!
We would also like to see you next Sunday 8th of July, as we have a visitor from Canada coming to sail with us. John Ball came to race his Marblehead in the first ‘radio Marblehead international’ at Gosport in 1975 when radio racing was in its infancy and he finished second. As there is no Marblehead sailing near him in Canada he is looking forward to racing them again. For those who might recognise his name, he is one of the world’s experts on racing rules and radio racing rules in particular. He has been nominated as the Regional Officer for North America to serve on the International Radio Sailing Association Executive Committee, where he will make a very good contribution to decisions that affect all of us at national level. You are most welcome to join us in our club race on Sunday, which starts at 10 AM.
Cheers, Roger
By |2018-07-05T15:33:55+01:00July 2nd, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on Wednesday’s ALE Event on 4 July is Definitely On
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GMYC Report of the GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy 24 June 2018

Dear All,

Whilst it was very disappointing to receive only one entry from outside the Guildford club, we were delighted that Peter Popham came from the Three Rivers club to enjoy a warm sunny day with the wind blowing most of the time straight down the lake from the North, although somewhat spasmodically. Peter was excited, as he brought his brand-new boat which he and Max Lemke had been building over the last few months using the UPROAR moulds and copious instructions that now go with it. This is remarkable in itself, but is part of a scheme originally to build three new boats and update the Three Rivers club fleet. The plan has now been extended to 4 new boats, so this is very encouraging for the Marblehead class and in the future we hope to see more of these boats coming to GMYC open races.

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 - for the Members Trophy

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy – Roger Stollery

Although part of a learning curve, with a difficulty with using a coloured gelcoat, Peter’s new boat UPROAR 71 looked magnificent, as it wasn’t just black but sprayed bright orange and with some fancy lettering. This and a few photographs of the racing itself is shown on the PDF pic page. I helped set up his rig and he enjoyed some good racing despite controlling the boat from his chair in just one location and he enjoyed winning three of the 12 races, as you can see from Alan’s results spreadsheet.

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 - for the Members Trophy

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy – Roger Stollery

As this was also an event for the GMYC Members trophy on a handicap basis, we assumed that the merit winner of the event would also win the trophy on handicap and we did present Alan with the trophy on this assumption as Alan had done really well. However we hadn’t worked out the handicap in detail and such is the brilliance of our handicap system, it was Peter Dunne who did best against his handicap. He will be delighted by this result as his performance with his STARKERS, which is also new this year has been steadily getting better each event and allowed him to win the trophy.

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 - for the Members Trophy

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy – Roger Stollery

Not to be disappointed, Alan Viney’s win on merit is satisfaction enough, but it does allow him to rocket up the GAMES leaderboard into fourth place as the 100 points at this event boosts his average score that he gets from being part of the race committee for the Mermaid Trophy.

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 - for the Members Trophy

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy – Roger Stollery

Whilst it would be nice to have more local club sailors and particularly the ex-GMYC members who sail at Datchet, everyone enjoyed the event and those who didn’t come, missed out on some good sailing. There were other attractions this weekend and the IOM ranking event at Southport took away a couple of likely sailors, and holidays took away several of our members, but this is no excuse for the other 60 local sailors who were invited to take part in this event. I don’t believe that the football World Cup or the Formula One Grand Prix really made that much difference.

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 - for the Members Trophy

GMYC GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy – Roger Stollery

However the question has to be asked how these Marblehead sailors can be persuaded to travel, for some very short distances, to increase the level of attendance and enjoyment at these Interclub events?

Cheers, Roger

By |2018-07-01T22:52:14+01:00July 1st, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on GMYC Report of the GAMES 4 & Interclub 3 – for the Members Trophy 24 June 2018
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GAMES 4 event at Abbey Meads this Sunday 24th June

Dear All,
Although the entry closed officially last night, we are keeping the entry open so that if you fancy some good sailing with your Marblehead, will be delighted to see you at Abbey Meads. There are three ways of entering, either using the MYA online entry system, emailing me or just ringing on (01483) 421801.
Cheers, Roger
By |2018-06-22T15:12:12+01:00June 22nd, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on GAMES 4 event at Abbey Meads this Sunday 24th June
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ALE on Wednesday 6th is cancelled and GAMES 4 on Sunday 10th June is postponed until Sunday 24th June

Dear All,
Unfortunately, GMYC are unable to run these events, on the published dates for which we apologise.  We hope that this will not upset your diary and we hope you will come and support our GAMES Interclub event on 24 June.
I personally hope that there will be good support for the ALE event on Wednesday 4th of July, as I have a group of friends coming to sample radio sailing and so it needs to be a good do, so please put this in your diary and come along for a fun afternoon.
Cheers, Roger
By |2018-06-05T23:39:02+01:00June 5th, 2018|Categories: Games|Comments Off on ALE on Wednesday 6th is cancelled and GAMES 4 on Sunday 10th June is postponed until Sunday 24th June
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Marblehead World Championship – Biblis Germany

Dear All,
This Marblehead World Championship 2018 was a marvellous event and huge thanks have to go to the full-size sailing club Segelverein -Biblis E.V and their hard-working and welcoming members who gave up their own sailing to create this event, which was instigated by Henning Faas, who is well known to GMYC members by his visits to our club.
The weather was superb with hot sun every day, which drove competitors and supporters alike to head for the shade if possible, as shown in the first two photos. Apart from the Tuesday and last day, Friday, there was very little wind and a lot of time on Wednesday and Thursday mornings was spent just waiting for the breeze to fill in.
There were lots of abandoned races as a result of wind speed and direction not being steady enough for long enough to complete a heat. However these periods of waiting were great for putting the world of model yachting to rights and making new friends. In my particular case such a friendship was created out of a rather embarrassing collision between UP and the top Russian, sailing Phil Holliday’s old QUARK, when we were close to the finishing line. This was quite unnecessary as we were both in a promotion position. Fortunately he got redress as I was on port.
As this event was the pinnacle of what is regarded as the Formula One class of radio sailing, the standard of boats, rigs and sails was superb, but it was the skippers who made the difference between boats of the same design.
No doubt you will have seen the results on the 2018 World Championship website, with Peter on the podium in third place behind Christophe Boinault and Brad Gibson on top, both sailing GRUNGEs. The Brits did well with four in the top six with Chris Harris sailing Nigel Winkley’s NIOUTRAM brilliantly and Graham Bantock in 6th.  Rob Vice did well and was delighted to pull himself up to 24th by the end of the week, unlike myself as the third member of the Guildford team, who had an embarrassingly poor event just going down from C heat to E heat and then not being able to get out until the last day when I climbed to B heat, but could go no further as we had run out of time and race 13 was abandoned. I was not alone as Martin Roberts had the same problem, only managing to get out of E on Thursday.
There was a great variety of rigs on show with only a few conventional A rigs, mainly beautiful ones on Walicki boats. In particular, there were several with strut attached to the mast a foot or so above the jib boom to hold the clew down in lieu of an offset pivot.
There were a great variety of fin constructions with bulb weights all looking on the light side. Christophe Boinault’s GRUNGE looked very light with obvious overhangs and like Peter his ballast was 3.2 kg as opposed to Brad’s 3.35 kg. Christophe won the first three races in very impressive style, but suffered a bit when the wind got to the top of A rig.
Peter reckoned that I was unlucky having two lots of weed, given two penalty turns by an umpire who had not seen that I was in the right, a battery failure and by a three times delayed start after which the wind died when I was in B rig.
My performance was not impressive, but the UP was and I was delighted that Peter got on the podium making all the effort of creating a new design well worthwhile, after his previous WC’s had resulted in lots of fourth places.
The Guildford Team camped and this was a great success and Oliver and Nathan had an absolutely marvellous time with the Ballington girls, lots of swimming both at the club and the campsite, where there was a real beach down to the water. The only downside was on Thursday night, when there was an almighty thunderstorm, sheet lightning, strong winds and heavy rain. Fortunately our two tents survived, but the open marquee alongside the clubhouse and you can see in first photograph was completely wrecked.
On the way back to catch the Eurotunnel train in Calais, Rob and I had a five hour debrief and put together some ideas for improvements. For Rob it was to improve his rigs which he has been developing whilst sailing the UPROAR over the last two years in order to fit to his new UP, which she didn’t finish in time for this event. For me it was ideas to improve the stability by simple means and possibly to reduce fin drag. There were many new boats which must be good for the class as those that are discarded will benefit those that might like to change their current boats.
Finally, there is just a reminder that we are running GAMES 4 interclub event on Sunday the 10th and I hope that you will give this your support. A Notice of Race will go out shortly.
Cheers, Roger
By |2018-06-20T23:41:59+01:00June 4th, 2018|Categories: News, Sailing|Comments Off on Marblehead World Championship – Biblis Germany
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World Marblehead Championship – Biblis Germany – May 28th – June 1st 2018

Roger is off to the World Marblehead championship this afternoon, meeting up with Rob and travelling with him by car through the tunnel on the first train tomorrow morning and then driving to BIBLIS, which is between Frankfurt and Mannheim. You should be able to see the Guildford team’s performance on the championship website. 10 rater championship starts today and finishes on Saturday and Marblehead start Monday to finish on Friday, 1 June. Good luck chaps!
By |2018-05-24T21:31:11+01:00May 24th, 2018|Categories: News, Sailing|Comments Off on World Marblehead Championship – Biblis Germany – May 28th – June 1st 2018
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