IOM Mid Week Handicap

There was a steady 5 or 6 knots of Northerly blowing straight down the dam this morning making perfect conditions for today’s IOM handicap racing. It was perhaps a knot lighter in the afternoon but it stayed around until we had completed the day’s racing. Ricky Price was today’s volunteer PRO and did the job excellently. Thanks Ricky. If you have not had opportunity to act as PRO this year and would be happy to volunteer then please let me know.

There did not seem to be much shifting it the wind today but generally those who went wide to the west side seemed to get more pressure and most times came off the better.

We have not seen Peter Webberley at Wednesday sailing for quite a while (due to work commitments) but it was good to see him today. Peter has bought Gerald Stephens V9 and sails it regularly at Forcett Lakes. And he sails it well too – Peter was today’s overall winner putting on a real clinic in the afternoon session with a hat-trick of race wins back-to-back. 

Second today was Rob Cooney. Rob was always in the top five for most of the day’s racing. And Phil Jackman took the third podium spot doing particularly well in a couple of races on the last little leg from the gate to the finish. Congratulations Peter, Rob and Phil.

Coming up:

No sailing Sunday due to being Easter Sunday.

Next Wednesday Risdon Brook Park will be closed for some maintenance and we are not able to sail. Our friends at Forcett Lakes have offered an invitation to anyone with the itch to sail to join with their IOM group next Thursday (That’s Thursday 24th April and button press is at 10:00.) Thanks so much for this Ricky and Peter. 

Our next Wednesday sail is on 30th April and will be a long-distance event. We hope to have two or three of these over the course of the year and each event will contribute towards the Long-Distance trophy. It may be that we will be sailing a little later on that day but we would hope to finish up by say 3:30. The club will be putting on a BBQ lunch on the day so all up it should be an enjoyable day.

The A Class State Championships is on the horizon - just a few weeks away and there are just two entries in at the moment. In fairness to the northern organising team, we really need to get entries in as they need to organise catering and trophies etc for the event (no use having a trophy with a date on it if it gets deferred/cancelled), so they really need entries in and at least 6 on the list before next Friday 25th April otherwise the event risks being cancelled.

Wishing all skippers a joyful Easter.

Shorty