​12 IOM’s sailed at the dam today with some recent absentees returning no doubt drawn by the good forecast. The fleet agreed to carry B rigs in in a gusty north west breeze with the usual dam bullets & light patches. A couple of breakdowns resulted in a reduced field of nine with some great scratch & handicap racing on a longer course. A number of winners with the B2 (15) & the Trojan (13) managing to score 2 wins each . 
 
A good days sailing despite the low water levels so at this stage we will be back next week. Kyle is attempting to obtain some info from Tas Water on future dam levels which will determine when Wednesdays return to Montrose.
Thanks to the PRO,s & those that helped with the dinghy.

​Eight sailors fronted up today for the first Long Distance day of the year. Lisa Blackwood brought along her new A Class yacht, Sister Blister, and gave it a quick shake down. From reports, it was sailing quite well for a first outing. Quite likely to see a second one making its debut in the next week as well.
 
Conditions sounded a bit tough with some fronts coming through, and along with it, some squalls across the dam. Everyone had to sail it though, and from who I spoke to this afternoon, it was quite an enjoyable day.
 
Andrew Wardrop came out most consistent on the day, winning on 14 points from new member, Justin Rogers, in Second on 17 points on countback from Peter Sylvester. From the results, it was pleasing to see you could drop a blanket across the first five places, showing the handicapper was on the money today.
 
Thanks to Lisa, for helping Justin out after his Cockatoo suffered a bit of water ingress and receiver failure – being able to finish the day off with Lisa’s Nitro. Great to see members helping each other out. It really makes a day enjoyable.
 
On Wednesday, we have our usual IOM Handicap at the dam, from 10am for some scratch warm ups and the handicap races starting from 11.
 
Next Sunday will see the resumption of IOM Scratch racing at MBYC from 1pm (Summer Series Round 2)

​A fleet of seven skippers at the dam today for some challenging sailing in a fitful northerly breeze with some big variations. No doubt the low water level effects the wind conditions. We started & finished with A rigs but at times, some B rig bullets saw some boats flattened - still all good & enjoyable.
 
Eight races sailed with the B2 woodies winning 2 races each showing they are starting to get on the pace. Kim Potter was as usual lurking before falling away in the later races similarly Peter Sylvester started well before deciding he felt more comfortable in the later races in the lower half of the fleet -still just good to see him back racing. John Hall was also sailing consistently.
 
The winner on the day though, was ever-reliable Rod Jackman, whose maximum handicap penalty was only just enough to keep him in front, with Andrew Wardrop and John Hall fighting it out for second and third respectively on countback

​Sunday sees Long Distance racing at the dam, starting at 11am as per the website, and we will also be sailing at MBYC on Monday for some practice. Looks to be from 10am for best tide on the day, so a BBQ afterwards is likely on the cards for those who want an Australia Day Public Holiday sail. Light winds predicted so far at about 12-14km/hr from the NW.

​A reasonably good turnout today at the dam, with 9 sailors attending – helped along with Richard and Cliff coming from down south.
 
From a phone call I had earlier, it sounded like conditions were challenging, with A rig conditions all day, with some bullets shooting through that really tested out the sailors when the extreme A conditions came along.
 
Some really close results at the end of the day, and I am sure the sailing itself would have been very close as well, such as it is with restricted design racing.
 
Overall winner (Pink Division) was Stu Dawes, bringing a very consistent performance across the day with 1’s and 2’s only being counted against his score of 13 points (from 11 races). Coming in second, on count back, was Chris Wood on 21 points, with Mike Hickman in third on the same points.
 
A pretty clear separation today to white division, with the southern invader, Cliff Eaves taking white fleet honours on 42 points, with Richard Barwick (47 points) taking home second on countback from Peter Sylvester. Keeping Richard and Peter honest was Phil Turnbull, just two points adrift.
 
Upcoming sailing days
Wednesday 22nd January – IOM Handicap at the dam, from 10am
Sunday 26th January – Long Distance Series Round 1 at the dam, starting at 11am
Monday 27th January – MBYC sailing (practice) for anyone. RM’s will be sailing, but any class welcome to practice if they want. We will advertise the start time when it gets a bit closer to the day, which will be based on the ideal tide/wind conditions for the day.

​A very hot day at the dam today. It must have been in the mid thirties. With 12 boats sailing the usual format in a shifty A rig northerly breeze which had a number of holes and some big wind shifts. Eight handicap races were completed, with all competitors flagging in the heat by the end of sailing.
 
Peter Sylvester made a very welcome return to sailing today. His orange V10 was, as usual, very quick and Peter was sailing well. Kim Potter won 2 races and usually sails with one hand on the bottle of wine but the nasty handicapper has now re allocated him to the pink devision so that might slow his wine consumption a bit – edit, maybe next week though…..
 
As is the new norm the fleet results were split into 2 divisions to spread out the wine winners 
 
Thanks to those who helped with PRO duties & the dinghy. The dam level has dropped a little more but we will stick with it for the next few weeks or so
 
Winner in the White division was Don McLeod, with a win, a couple of seconds and a third making him the most consistent on the day. Well done.
Winner in the Pink division was Kim Potter. The elevation to Pink Division didn’t deter him this week, with a couple of wins really helping. Handicapper is on you though with 15 seconds taken off.

RBRYC Results - RM Summer Series Scratch Round 1
An earlier start for the sailors today, given the poor afternoon tide conditions. Proved to be a great decision to change times, with it being extremely low at the end of the day.
Eight skippers fronted the starting line today, with Rod Jackman sailing Lisa's Skalpel for the day. He got comfortable very quickly, taking out the first two races. Unfortunately for Rod, some electrical issues took him out mid way through the day - otherwise he would have seriously challenged the top two today. I think Rod will be back sailing the RM's again very soon.
Great sailing conditions throughout the day ensured that all racing was real close and nicely contested, showing through with 6 of the 8 skippers taking a win on at least one race.
In the end, as is normally the case, the cream rose to the top, and John Cole-Cooks focus and consistency ensured the round win on the day, on just 22 points (from 13 races). Lisa Blackwood was almost always at the pointy end as well, coming in second on 29 points. Third place was decided on count-back with John Hall proving the older Fuzzy Logic still has the goods in a bit of breeze, taking the third position.
A big thanks goes to Mike Hickman, who came out to Pro for the day.
This coming Wednesday is back to the IOM Mid Week Handicap from 10am and Sundays racing is a DF95 scratch day - at Risdon Brook Dam as well, from the normal summer start time of 1pm.

​What a great days sailing today in warm & sunny conditions. A solid fleet of 10 boats turned up although Buzzy B had a receiver problem so spent the morning socialising. 
 
Light winds greeted the scratch racing before the sea breeze started to assert & strengthen after lunch giving some great sailing in upper A rig conditions. 
Our PRO today was Rod Marshall who conducted racing in a firm & efficient manner so many thanks to Rod.
 
Very good to see Richard Barwick celebrate his 50th birthday with us. Kim Potter won four races, a deserved first place for him this month.
Justin Rogers was also having a good day with 2 wins - he is definitely on the march forward in the fleet. Well done on your second place for the day.
With PRO duties handed across for the day, Andrew Wardrop was able to sail for the day, and was well rewarded with third place for the day
Mike Hickman was the handicap back marker & showed his usual mastery of the dam despite his tough handicap.
 
Thanks also to Phil for collecting & returning the dinghy. Dam level is still dropping but we will stay with it & see how the level stands at the end of the month.

​A wonderful day greeted the 14 sailors who came along for the first scratch round of the year. The hardest decision on the day was choosing the A or B rig, given the wind wanted to mess with both throughout. In the end, we had just two intrepid sailors with enough intestinal fortitude to use the A during the day (both taking out wins when the wind didn’t get too much for them), the rest remained on B. Stu Dawes came along to pro for the day (thanks Stu), however, after a few races, Les Hanson passed his controller on to Stu and Les Pro’d for the rest of the day. Thanks for your help today guys.
 
The buoys were checked  and re-set where needed, giving us multiple start lines now, as well as the ability to start into both the northerlies (such as today) and to cater for the afternoon southerlies, should they turn up – all in aid of less time on course preparation. Still room to improve, but we are getting very close to a real good placement of marks for any condition.
 
Unfortunately, we had a few breakdowns today, which took a fair number of skippers out, but they will be back for round two, with the reliability issues all sorted. The racing itself was amongst the best I have seem in a very long time. Not only was it quite close in the results – more so than the final tally shows, but you could often have 4-6 yachts finishing within seconds of each other.
 
It was also fantastic to see the on-course communication improved so much, advising others of what you were doing etc. Also, the amount of penalties taken without any prompting at all has to be mentioned. Great to see someone apologise for an error and quickly doing their penalty turn, and for the ones called for buoy contact, all of them (as far as I saw) were done without question and straight away. Exactly what the club needs to promote – so a great job by everyone today.
 
We had our two new members on the water today, Paul and Justin Rogers, both sailing Cockatoos. Both had some issues on the water, but given time, will start to finish many more races and become competitive in time. Give it time and patience guys, and the rewards will come.
 
There was a slight issue with the Rib being used in the middle of the bay today, but on request, it came back nice and quick to perform recoveries. This was discussed after the sail day in the bar, and in the future, if the Rib is being used, we will have communication to the MBYC control box, either by phone or radio, and can then request recovery through that method, which should pose no issue at all.
 
It was decided in our last committee meeting to experiment with a handicap system on the day, to help encourage newer sailors. They can scratch race with the experienced ones, yet have something to feel real good about at the end of it with an improvement seen in their handicap result. On that, the method used for this (and it is seen to be flexible to try to reward and encourage the right skippers) is that the skippers on the day have their last 5 results collated and averaged. A skipper will need a minimum of three past results to enable a handicap, which will be averaged as well and moved to the 5 result average when they get 5 results. This averaged result is compared against the other skippers on the day to gain their ranking amongst skippers. Consider this ranking similar to a golf handicap. Then, the days results is compared against the 5 result average to get a net score, and the highest net score wins the handicap on the day.
Example;
Jason has past 5 results of 6, 4, 5, 2, 11
This gives him an averaged result of 5.6
This is compared against all the other skippers on the day, giving him a ranking of 8 out of the 14 skippers present on the day
He finishes in 4th place on the day
His handicapped score is then 4
This handicapped score is compared against all the other skippers, with the highest score being the handicap winner
 
I’ll post the handicap results after the scratch ones.
 
Today, Ray Joyce blasted out of the blocks, and was hardly headed, a deserved winner of round 1 on 14 points. Rod Jackman had a welcome return to form, maintaining some excellent consistency (and seemingly knowing exactly how many drops he could have) coming in second on 18 points. Mike Hickman was also very consistent, coming in third on 22 points.

​Now, to handicap scores for the day. We had three skippers with not enough results to get a handicap position – however, they will soon. The handicap results are as follows;

​Handicap winners on the day were myself on 4 points differential, followed by Rod Jackman on 3 points, followed by Lisa Blackwood on 2 points.
 
Upcoming Sailing
Wednesday, 8th January is DF95 handicap at the dam, starting at 10am for an hours scratch racing, and then on to the handicap.
Sunday, 12th January is RM Scratch Series Round 1 at MBYC

Last sail before Christmas today with a fleet of 13 IOM’s sailing in light to moderate northerly breezes in warm conditions with quite a few holes to be traversed.
 
Usual format with 8 races completed in the handicap series. Rod Marshall had his B2 going very well today so he should feature in the results.
 
To even out the wine winners I have now split the fleet in 2 ( for wine prizes only ) The more experienced sailors with the better boats are in the white fleet & the less experienced with older boats will be in the pink fleet so we will see how the results come out. For interest, a similar method will also be trialled for the scratch races, possibly based on average ranking of the last five rounds compared to the current rounds result for a “handicap” result on top of the standard scratch result – to make it more interesting for the newer sailors and those with older yachts as well.
 
Interestingly, Rod Marshall in the Pink fleet took out he honours overall for the day. Great effort Rod. Highest ranked “White Fleet” sailor was Chris Woods, with yet another fantastically consistent performance. The handicapper is watching both of you….. Great also seeing Paul and Justin Rogers making their presence felt, with a couple of seconds. Wont be long and consistency will come along as well guys. Keep the efforts coming along.
 
The dam level has taken a solid drop in the past week so I will check it again before we recommence after Christmas on the 8th of January to make sure the dam is still sailable.
 
Have a good Christmas to all club members & thanks to the Wednesday sailors for your continued support.
 
This coming Sunday, 22nd December is not an official race day, however, there is a good amount of interest with the RM sailors planning on sailing from 1pm at MBYC. If you have an RM and want to come and enjoy an afternoon’s sailing, please come along. If you don’t have an RM and would like to have a sail, you are also most welcome to come along. At a guess, I think we will be having some short races for practice with starts etc.

​Well, the last “official” hit out has been a resounding success, with 15 sailors fronting up to sail the last Scratch Series round for the year. It was fantastic to see some not-so-regular faces coming along for the day, and also a warm welcome to two new Sunday sailors, Paul and Justin Rogers.
This week, because of the inclement weather, we decided to set the course up in front of the clubhouse, rather than get rained on horribly (as was threatening) at the point. A bit of a late start with the lack of wind, but we finally got under way. With the exception of two races, we only sailed one-lappers in order to keep race times to around 10 minutes. We attempted a two lap race and a modified one and a half lap race, but wind proved too unreliable to get the course length in the allotted time.
 
This week, by the end of our eight races, Wayne Behrens came out well in front, taking three wins. Certainly has the Trojan going well. Ray Joyce came in second, 6 points adrift, with Mike Hickman a further four behind, on 24 points.
 
Given the amount of yachts on the water, there were very few penalties for contact and early starts, which was great. I’d also like to thank Anne Cole-Cook and Phil Turnbull for their assistance of the Pro throughout the day. It certainly would have been much harder without you there helping.
 
Following the sailing, we went indoors for our end of year BBQ and presentations. It was fantastic seeing 25 people there to help celebrate the year we had.
 
Before going to our winners and champions, I’d like to thank everyone who brought along a dish to help cater the meal, as well as the many helpers doing the BBQ, preparing the salads and deserts. After a lovely, relaxed meal, Mike Hickman and John Hall ran through the presentations. All the details are listed below for those who could not make it today. Congratulations to all winners.
 
Afterwards, John Cole-Cook, who recently returned as top ranking “Legend” class at the recent IOM Worlds in Brazil, gave a speech on his experience at the World Championships, and some of his many learnings from the experience. Some very interesting and relevant points brought up about mark rounding and communication amongst skippers. A massive importance to not only the top ranked skippers, but most of the sailors that John watched, in avoiding contact at pretty much any cost – as contact, and the likelihood of losing a lot of places was so important to avoid. Simple things such as call outs like “John has this mark” well before rounding a mark, to try to ensued everybody gives respectful distance prior to rounding, and then resuming tight, close racing as soon as they have rounded the mark. Something that resonated with me personally, as I myself have fallen foul of being too close at mark roundings, fouling not only myself, but also other innocent sailors. Something personally to work really hard on next year. John has kindly offered to talk about his experiences to anyone who would like to hear about them.
 
To todays scoresheet, as mentioned, Wayne was way too good today, with Ray and Mike rounding out the podium.

​I have also attached our final series results, summarised below. Congratulations to all winners;

​With the “Official” part of the year over, it is interesting listening to many people about the club, where it has been and where it may be heading. John touched on it while talking about his World’s experience, that our club over the past few years has really seen improvement, not only in its competitiveness, but with some new faces coming on, and with functions such as the end of season one, such a good atmosphere amongst many friends. The partnership with MBYC has really helped the club, with the availability of their fantastic facilities, where we can have a nice warm and welcoming bar to chat after a sail day, or for our functions. In multiple ways, this is also a benefit starting to come through from Rob Gavin’s work a year and a half ago with his workshops on our strategic plan for the next 5 or so years.
 
Personally, I’m a believer that a club doesn’t have to change a lot, it just needs to constantly evolve to be a better one moving in to the next year than it was when it entered the current year.  On that point, I believe the club has achieved that this year. We have not been without issue obviously, but I hope that its members can see that we are working hard to become a better club tomorrow than we were yesterday. That is not a bad thing about yesterday, but a sign of a healthy club in that it constantly looks to evolve and become better for not only its members, but the general community it is a part of.
 
Upcoming Sailing
Although the year is “officially” finished for the club, we still have two more sail days planned.
This coming Wednesday, 18th December, will still be the regular IOM Handicap at Risdon Brook Dam, starting at 10am for an hour of scratch racing, followed by the handicap races at 11.
Next Sunday, 22nd December, some of our Marblehead sailors are heading to MBYC for a 1pm start for practice. Whether you have an RM or not, if you would like to come and have a sail, please feel free to do so.
 
To close out (sorry, this one is a bit long), if we don’t see you beforehand, have a great Christmas and new year. Relax and enjoy – and be safe. We look forward to seeing you on the water again in the new year. Our calendar is updated on the RBRYC Website, with the first Summer Series event being on Sunday, 5th January (IOM Summer Series Round 1). I’m not sure if Mid Week sailing commences on January 1, but we will let you know. I’ll be in bed early the day before so will be good to go, but it depends on expected turnout.
 
Thanks for a great year, and look forward to a better one again next year.