Below is some news that some of you new IOM skippers may not have seen but might be interested in. There’s also news for DF65 skippers
Every month in 2019, Rotherham MYC will be sailing two IOM open series events (the Craig Rastrick Trophy Series event and the Ted Ward Trophy Series event) and one DF65 / RG65 event – (the George Cliff Trophy Series event). All are sailed at Harthill Reservoir once a month throughout the year. A table of all the dates of these events can be found here.
This Saturday – 19th Jan 2019, will be the first of the Ted Ward IOM Series. Briefing will be at 9:45
There are an impressive number of open events in the Northern District this February, and they can be found on the ND IOM Events page
For our first club event of the New Year, twelve skippers turned out in what began as a flat mill pond with hardly a breath, it took forever to complete our first race on a simple up and down course using half the length of the lake. In hindsight if we had waited about three quarters of an hour or so we would have been blessed with a nice breeze from the start, as it was we struggled on through our first few races with the wind very slowly picking up, we decided a brew was our best option and to get into the warmth of the clubhouse for a while. Brew over and to our amazement not only had the wind got up, but it was enough for a sail change from A+ to A, so out we went, and after a slight course change we had some good racing for the remaining time. Eleven races were had in the day with five different skippers taking bullets, but it was Uncle Derek who came out on top, from Garry and John. So what began as looking like a non-event, turned out to be a great days racing, and we even had time at the end for Derek to go over one or two rules, regarding the start and rights of way at the marks.
5 of the country’s top 10 ranked IOM skippers battled it out in a fleet of 17 boats at Fleetwood’s Twixmas regatta last Sunday.
With visitors from the Midlands & Yorkshire joining the 8 local members the sailors enjoyed a day of cut & thrust close quarters racing between 10am & 3,30pm interspersed with Bacon Butties, Mince pies & Mulled Wine, & cups of tea & coffee.
The wind very conveniently blew straight down the lake with a few subtle shifts & slightly varying strength between 10 & 12 knots. A full-length course was set of 2 full laps making each race approx 1000 metres.
14 races were completed before bad light stopped play at sometime after 3pm.
In the end the usual suspects came out on top with Walshy & Tushy tying for 1st , Walshy winning on countback. An interloper, Shaun Priestley, stole 3rd place by 1 point from Chris Harris, then Darin Ballington & Derek Priestley 5th & 6th made up the 5 of the top 10 rankers. David Winder (Winder Boats of Merlin Rocket & Solo fame) turned up with a very swish looking newly finished boat to Dave Holloms “Dead Reckoning” design, which looked beautiful & showed great promise.
So ended a great weekend 2 day “Twixmas Regatta with 18 DF 95’s on sat & 17 IOM’s on Sunday. It certainly blew away the cobwebs!!
See you next Twixmas!
Footnote
Fleetwood club now have some 16 IOM’s within our membership and we hope to re-start IOM club racing this season.
And here are the results of the DF95 event on the previous day.
Next year’s calendar of events is now online. Event start times are as per the as yet unpublished Events Booklet, event end times are a guideline only.
