Scottish and North of England Traveller and Royal Findhorn YC Regatta 9th - 10th July

Four Europes took part in the slow handicap class of the Royal Findhorn Yacht Club' annual regatta in Findhorn Bay on 9th and 10th July, which also formed the second event in the Scottish and North of England Europe Traveller series. Val Ludlow for Port Edgar and Brian Finnie from Loch Tummel joined local sailors Ted Stroud and Neil Fraser. Two races were held each day within Findhorn Bay in light winds which varied from North West to North East through the weekend. The incoming tidal flow was from the North and each day the start was about an hour before high water, giving time for two races before the water disappeared again. While the locals thought that the small neap tide would minimise the tidal effects, the visitors were unconvinced as the bay filled up through the racing area!

Saturday

Wind North Westerly 7-8 knots. The Race Officer set a triangle for the first race but keeping the windward mark in deeper water made for a start line biased strongly in favour of port tack. Val and Brian both timed the start to the second but it was Val who got clear and picked off the Mirrors in the preceding class to get to the windward mark ahead. Ted and Neil caught up from a poorer start with Ted reaching the windward mark ahead of Brian. Brian recovered to stay ahead of Ted to the finish. Neil, out for only the second time this year, trailed uncharacteristically behind.

A trapezoidal course was set for the second race, which started in around 8 knots of wind but this dropped through the race. Once again the tidal stream meant that the line could only just be crossed on Starboard. Brian made a near perfect pin end start but then had to wait for the fleet to tack before being clear to tack himself to the favoured port tack. He still reached the mark ahead of Val who had taken an early port tack inshore. Neil had gone left with Brian, but misjudged his tack to the mark, arriving too close to the mark to join the fleet on starboard and was second from the back before he found his way into the line of boats, leaving Val, Brian and Ted well ahead. On the reach Val sailed over Brian to be ahead at the first wing mark and continued to open out her lead to finish first. Meanwhile Ted worked hard to overtake Brian but never quite made it. Neil showed good boat speed to get back in contention but the course was too short for him to recover from his early deficit.

Sunday

The forecast of 8 knots increasing to 12 knots was hopeful, but depended on the sea breeze. The sight of 100 percent cloud cover to landward suggested this would not materialise and indeed the wind stayed even lighter than the previous day, starting Northerly and moving North East at the end of racing.

With another triangular course for the first of the the afternoon's races,  Val, Neil and Brian went left after the start to the shallower water over the sands while Ted went inshore. Val crossed just ahead of Neil at the windward mark and and these two opened up a good lead over Ted and Brian who had a close race for the lower places. Brian held off Ted until the second beat when Ted made the right choices to cross ahead by the mark. The order stayed the same until the finish with Val and Neil taking first and second Europe places, Ted third just ahead of Brian.

For the final race the RO set a short windward leeward course to get everyone back to shore in time for visitors to leave. Two tacks brought the windward mark within reach and the order was Neil, Brian, Val and Ted and this order was held downwind before Val sailed through to the front on the second beat. Ted closed on Brian to cross ahead by the gate, at which point Brian took a rest, not realising that the shorten course signal had only applied to the Mirror class, leaving Ted to keep third place unchallenged.

Results

Val Ludlow won convincingly and for the second year running was the winner of the overall handicap class. Brian Finnie was awarded second place under the club's scoring system, and was third in the overall handicap results.

Once again the meeting highlighted some of the problems of incorporating a Class Traveller within a Handicap event. On Saturday the first race was shortened after the Europes were through the gate but, with the wind dropping, this left Ted Stroud with an average lap time behind an Enterprise who had been behind Ted on the water at the previous lap. As the club used overall places to calculate results, this created an anomaly for the overall results. A further anomaly was brought about by the same policy as, using the overall handicap results, Brian Finnie was awarded second place in the Europe Traveller, while had the Europe place results been considered in isolation from the handicap fleet, Neil Fraser would have taken second place. (For the series result published below, as last year, the Europe results are taken as though only Europes were competing).

Results table