Victory Class early season report
by Kim Taylor 14 Jun 2012 12:52 BST
Strong early season turnouts for the Victory Class in 2012 © Kim Taylor
Despite the wettest, windiest and coldest start to the season for many years, Class turn outs remain strong. Several series have been decided and all have been hotly contested, with one point generally separating the top places.
Sixteen boats competed in the Vail Williams Tuesday Series which came down to Kim Taylor's Zest beating Mark Dennigton's Ziva by a couple of boat lengths in the last race to take the series by a point. Hugh Pringle's Zepyhr was third.
Fourteen took part in the first Thursday Series. Clive Cokayne's Zara won the first race of the season for the Taylor Trophy and went on to win the series from Ziva with Andrew Terry third in Minx. Minx also won the Bob Smith Memorial Pursuit Race from Zarena and Fenella.
In place of the cancelled Westmacott Regatta a one day mini series was contested by nine boats, the clear winner,with three firsts, being Janet Dee's Variety with Sean Hopkins at the helm.
In the regular Saturday series for the Naomi House Helmsmans Cup the series again was decided by a point in favour of Zest from Geoff Dixon's Zelia.
The one off Saturday Special race was won by Variety ahead of Minx and the Evans consortium's Peregrine.
The fleet sat out a vicious 35 knot squall before the start of the KB Boat Parks Harbour race for the Bishop Painting which was eventually won by Hugh Pringle's Zephyr from Zest,with Gareth Penn's Zircon, third.
The Cowes Week entry is 15 boats at present with hope for a couple more come the event.