DF95 Winter Scratch Round 1

​Cold and blustery at the dam today. Leaving home, I was convinced we'd be in B rigs at best, C rigs maybe later on, but as it turned out, we had our A Suite on for the entirety of the day.

With the inclement weather, Les wisely decided to stay at home, so with just 8 on board today, we decided to run the sailing without an official Pro on the start line and the first finished would scribe the results, with second across calling the finishers as they crossed. It worked very well today, so we have got to thank all skippers for their honesty, fair play and assistance with the tasks required.

A start between 5-6 with a beat to 4 and across to 3, long run to 8, across to 7 and then back to 3-4 for the finish made for a good course for the day.

We had two new skippers with us today - with big thanks to Lisa for getting a spare DF95 up and running, while also checking that the club boat was ready for action.

Welcome to Nick Connor, new member from DSS, as well as Scott Brain who also came from DSS as a visitor today. They both really enjoyed the day from the sounds of it, and we hope to see both of you regularly sailing with us into the future.

The wind for the day was predominantly a southerly for much of the day, with 30 degree shifts to both the east and west throughout. Our new sailors got an extreme example of the shiftyness of the dam, and quickly found out which sailors went best in those conditions.

That said, the day was enjoyed by everybody.

First place today was the DF95 Dam Master, Stu Dawes. Winning 5 of the 10 races - some by a signifcant margin. Thoroughly deserving the round win on just 12 points.

Second place, 7 points adrift, was Ray Joyce on 19 points. Ray had somme superb speed on the day, showing some fantastic acceleration out from the pack at the start on multiple occasions.

Third place (and starting to make a habit of it) was John Hall on 25 points. Sailing real consistent and after three podium positions, wondered out loud if he was going to get a race win - then got it in race 9. Well deserved.

In Silver fleet, we only had the top three today with a few skippers missing at the moment. John Hall was the runaway leader with a clean slate for the day, finishing on 8 points.
Then there was the battle of the DSS - Scott Brain won that battle today on 16 points, with Nick Connor on 32. Expect both of them to improve markedly as they come to grips with the nuances of tuning and sailing the DF95.

Coming Up

IOM Handicap Racing on webdesday at the Dam, button press at 11am

A Class Scratch next Saturday at the dam, button press at 10am. Note, we will get around the skippers to see if we can get four minimum on the day. If not, we will postpone the sailing.

RM Scratch Racing next Sunday at the dam, button press at 10am


Kyle