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South Windermere - 2005 |
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South Windermere 1st - 2nd October Early October is often a windy time of year, and the forecast for the first day of the South Windermere traveller was for 30 knot winds from the Northwest. However, down on the water between the hills and trees of South Windermere the winds remained light and fluky all weekend, giving a test of tactics, responsiveness and agility for the competitors and Race Officer. The Europe event was added to the normal club racing series each day, providing a traveller meeting without putting too much additional load on the resources of the club. The Europes were given a separate start, ahead of the handicap and, on Sunday, the Flying Fifteen classes. The short courses and variable winds usually kept the other fleets clear of the Europes. Visitors Katie Mapplebeck, Stacey Vials and Brian Finnie joined local sailor Liz Ashburn for the single race on Saturday and were joined by Pete Dowker on Sunday for the three final races. Race 1 Despite Saturday's forecast there was little wind at the start of the single race on Saturday. The wind before the start was north-westerly and light with minor gusts, but by the start the wind had shifted to the west and throughout the race was to shift continuously between NW and SW, sometimes light, sometimes short gusts of never more than 10 – 12 knots. The course was a triangle-sausage with marks to starboard because of the geography of the lake – narrow north to south – in the nominally NW breeze. A wind shift at the start created a port biased line and Katie, Stacey and Brian all started at the port end on port tack. Liz mistimed her approach and found herself at the starboard end at the gun and trailed behind the others at the start. Katie got away first and stayed to the right looking for the headed tack, while Stacey and Brian chose to put in some short tacks on the shifts. The main shift went left, leaving Katie down to leeward and it was Stacey who arrived first at the mark, closely followed by Brian before Katie came in from the right side of the course somewhat behind. However Katie made up her losses on the next reaching leg to get to the first wing mark in the lead. From then on the order remained largely unchanged, but the three leaders stayed together for several laps until Stacey's need to concentrate on keeping Brian behind at a windward mark allowed Katie to break away down the following reach, while Brian's boom hit the mark while putting in a tack inside Stacey, letting her also get away while he completed a 360. By now the wildly shifting wind had made nearly all the legs a mixture of windward and reaching work. Liz meanwhile had been steadily making up for her poor start to close in on Stacey and Brian, finally overtaking Brian during the final “windward” leg, now a close reach. Trying to cut inside at the mark, Brian failed to keep clear of Liz and his subsequent 720 gave Liz the chance to get away. The vagaries of the wind however put Liz too far to windward at the finish and nearly allowed Brian to recover his loss by sailing the direct course for the end of the line, only failing to catch Liz by seconds at the finish. Race 2 The wind on Sunday was again light, this time from the south-west, shifting at times to southerly. A short triangular course of several laps was set. The start favoured starboard tack. In the light winds no-one risked being too far away from the line and with the shore limiting the line of approach, all stayed too close and at the gun found themselves further down the line than planned. Stacey judged the start best, and had developed a good lead by the windward mark, followed by Pete, Katie and Liz with Brian some way behind. Stacey continued to work her way further out in front while Pete, Katie and Liz chased in a bunch. Brian used his advantage from being behind on the downwind legs to work his way up from the back. Half way into the expected race duration the wind died but, surprisingly, this did not create any major gains or losses. Once it had sprung up again from the south, Stacey was still well ahead. Pete and Katie broke away from Liz and Brian made up distance to battle Liz for last place. Pete was slowed by a sailing canoe at the penultimate mark and Katie made up the remaining distance to get through to get ahead of Pete by the line. Race 3 For the first race of the afternoon the wind was in the south-west at the start but was shifting at times to north-west. The course was set as a figure of eight, with two windward legs across the lake. Once again the line had a port tack bias and all tacked to port on crossing the line. Katie and Stacey were first away with Pete close behind, then Brian and Liz. The first three led a close race and on the second downwind leg the wind died again, leaving Liz and Brian behind in a hole. On the final downwind leg Katie and Pete led from Stacey but Pete broke through at the mark to finish ahead of Katie on the reach. Stacey had also sailed into a hole on the upwind leg and was left behind to finish third. Brian only just held off Liz at the finish. Race 4 With the wind varying still between north-west and south-west the Race Officer set a short triangle course for the last race of the day, and was fortunate to get the Europes off in what was the best windward start of the weekend. Brian went right and benefited from a shift to the north-west, but a header on the tack to the mark let Katie in ahead. On the downwind leg Katie and Brian kept their places and Pete worked his way from behind the others to get to the next mark ahead of Stacey and Liz. It transpired that the Race Officer had posted the wrong mark number on the course board and instead of repeating the true – if anything at Windermere can ever be true – windward starting leg, the route to the “windward” mark was now a fetch, where the heading and lifting wind needed fast responses. Katie and Brian hung on to their lead but in the next legs the chasing group started to make up ground. With there no longer being a real windward section it was clearly going to be a question of tactics at the wing and leeward marks that decided who was going to have the overtaking opportunities. At the next downwind mark, with Katie round ahead, Stacey managed to get an inside overlap on Brian while the other two decided at the last minute to go close round the outside, leaving Brian nowhere to go. When the resulting noise had died down, Stacey was out of trouble and well ahead, but now with no more chance of making ground on Katie. Pete and Brian were left doing 720s, while Liz, who had avoided the other boats up to now, hit the mark while trying to slip through and joined the others in a 360, leaving Katie and Stacey unchallenged. The new back markers battled it out, with Pete's better reaching speed getting him past Brian, only for them both to land in another hole which lasted long enough to let Liz past Brian until they again swapped places in the final run to the line. Summary As ever, South Windermere provided a different kind of sailing for the visitors. Only a single point separated Katie and Stacey and with only a minor change of fortune the result could easily have gone the other way. Pete made the most of his single day, taking one of the first places. Brian and Liz found themselves near the front occasionally. The racing was frequently close and the fleet stayed in close contention during all the races, and only the incidents at the marks in the first and last races separated the boats significantly. South Windermere Sailing Club is small and friendly. It has its own clubhouse within good facilities provided by the National Trust. Even the tourist pleasure steamer gave way to sail during its trips through the racing area. Brian Finnie GBR348 Results
This was both a Traveller Trophy event in the national series and the final event in the Scottish and North of England series. The Traveller Series' updates can be found on the Results Page
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