Racing reports - 15th April 2014

The first race in the Autumn Series at Shanklin was sailed in light force 2-3 conditions, Liam Thom made an excellent start followed by Paul Grattage, the two of them were never challenged and in fact opened up a quite a considerable lead from the rest of the field and finished in that order with Erling Holmberg third.

The first race on Sunday was the Pursuit Race or as is known to some, the ritualistic humiliation race. Boats set off at different intervals and in an ideal world all should end up at the finishing line together, it never turns out that way but it does cause controversy which is always nice to see. Ian Bolton managed to climb up through the fleet with John Shenton close behind, they finished in that order with Bob Marks coming in third, and there were twelve starters.

The second race of the day was in the Preston Points series, once again Liam Thom attacked right from the start along with Piggy Pierce and the pair of them headed out to sea where the wind appeared to be, but as is quite usual with wind it seemed to subside and fill in from a different quarter. This left Keith Newnham, who has been known to accept charity, with a gifted win followed by Pierce and Thom. How the race should have finished was then discussed at great lengths by the participants in the club house afterwards.

Arthur K Newnham