IOM Mid Week Handicap

Another great day at the dam today. A bit light early, but the wind increased to the top of A rig towards the end of the day and some good sailing was had by all.

An excellent turnout again by the members, with 18 yachts on the water. An excellent display for Minister Nic Street, who came along to have a look at the club, its acivities and what sort of service we provided to the community. A very productive session with him, and hopefully we might be able to get some favourable discussions in the future in regards to some upgrades to facilities we so desperately need. A massive thanks to Rod Marshall (as well as Ray and Les for proof reading and input with the documentation), who has worked very hard behind the scenes to make this happen and has also provided an excellent set of documentation that was presented to the Minister for further reference. If anyone would like to see a copy of the documentation given to the Minister, let me know and I will email a copy to you.

Upgrades we are looking at now for the club are quite expensive, so if any members have any ideas for fundraising or money sourcing options, please contact someone on the committee. Our next priorities are improved  launching access at both Risdon Brook and Montrose Bay and are not cheap. 

To date, the club has sourced internally - or sourced external funding for our Defib, Solar Panel, new Outboard Motor at Montrose Bay, Electric Motor at Risdon, and Rib/Trailer package that is transported between Montrose and Risdon Brook - as well as our regular maintenance to both sets of buoys at Montrose and Risdon, so we have come a long way in the last few years with our upgrades so far. All of this has stemmed from the original strategy drawn up from the sessions from within the membership by Rob Gavin back in 2018, and a lot of the results has got to be attributed as well to the members input back then as well as Rob's fantastic organisational and communicational abilities.

But - back to sailing....

Ten races completed today, and with 18 competitors - 16 in one race, 15 in a few others, then 13 in a few more - there was quite a lot of close sailing in around the marks. A few collisions about the place, but from what I observed, penalties were taken when required, and the day stayed quite calm throughout. A pleasant day on the water.

One person particularly kept his nose clean and found that sailing out in clear air and often sailing the long way around a pack of sailors had a distinct advantage. Rewards came thick and fast, with two wins, a second and a third. A worst counted score of just 5th was fantastic amongst such a big fleet. A great round win to Ricky Price with 17.1 Points today. Congrats Ricky.

In second place, also very consistent with three podiums (and two wins) was Ian Hey. 12.9 points behind on 30 points. That Wooden Corby 5 is absolutely flying. The guy controlling the thumbs is doing pretty good too.

Third place today, five points behind is Peter Sylvester, on 35 points. Pretty sure Peter believes you are only ever as good as your last race with a fine win in that last one.

Thank you to everyone who came along today, to show such great support to the club while we had Minister Street in attendance. We really hope the support shown has raised the profile of the club in a really good way for us into the future.

Coming up

Sunday is DF95 Scratch at the Dam, button press is at 1pm

Next Wednesday is IOM Mid Week Handicap at the Dam, button press at 11am

Kyle