Miracle Southern Championships at Redoubt Sailing Club

Miracle Southern Championships at Redoubt © Brian Mumford

The weather was kind for Redoubt Sailing Club's first open meeting in many years. With the sun shinning 6 visitors joined the 4 club members boats for some close racing in light shifty conditions.

The first race started with all boats too keen to get to line and a general recall followed, luckily for Neal Gibson & Keith Macey 4040 as they were sailing in the wrong direction at the gun! The restart however was more to their liking with a good start leading to first round the windward mark, closely followed by Brian Jones & Paul Cook 4021 and Nick & Indigo Smith 3805. The rest of the fleet were close behind and at times threatened the top 3 positions, 4th place was fought over with Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson 3692 trying hard to defend from New crew Yvonne & Brian Mumford 4047 pushing hard. Eventually 4047 came through and looked like stealing 2nd as boats in front tried a luffing battle on the last spinnaker leg, but the top three held firm and positions ended as follows: 1st Neal Gibson & Keith Macey 4040, 2nd Brian Jones & Paul Cook 4021, 3rd Nick & Indigo Smith 3805, 4th Yvonne & Brian Mumford 4047, 5th Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson 3692.

With a change in course race 2 started with Yvonne & Brian Mumford 4047 well over at the gun, but after returning to the line still managing to round the windward mark 3rd. The top two places were held by Neal Gibson & keith Macey 4040 and Nick & indigo Smith 3805, the lead changed on several occasions with the wind often shifting 45% making decisions to tack up the beats very testing. Nick & Indigo Smith 3805 eventually snuck through for the win with Neal & Keith Macey 4040 2nd, Yvonne & Brian Mumford 4047 3rd, Brian Jones & Paul Cook 4021 4th & Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson 3692 5th.

All crews entered the final race with none of the top places decided. Brian Jones & Paul Cook 4021 got off to a flyer and lead round the windward mark, closely followed by the rest of the fleet. Neal Gibson & Keith Macey 4040, Nick & Indigo Smith eventually pulled through to fight for the top 2 positions which was not decided till the final beat. A battle for 4th place between Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson 3692 and Yvonne Mumford & Brian Mumford 4047 was taking place behind the top 3; with positions changing on frequent occasions, Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson 3692 eventually pulled through to take 4th. 1st position was ultimately decided a couple of boat lengths from the finish with Neal Gibson & Keith Macey 4040 taking 1st place from Nick & Indigo Smith 3805 and with it the Championships, with Brian Jones & Paul Cook 4021 taking 3rd.

Thanks to all at Redoubt SC for supporting and running this event, lets hope more open meetings will return in the future to this great venue.

Overall Results:

1st Neal Gibson & Keith Macey, 4040 (Redoubt SC)
2nd Nick & Indigo Smith 3805, (Thornbury SC)
3rd Brian Jones & Paul Cook, 4021 (Maidenhead SC)
4th Yvonne & Brian Mumford, 4047 (Redoubt SC)
5th Tracy Amos & Gemma Gibson, 3692 (Redoubt SC)
6th Keith & Christina Jeremiah, 3738 (Wilsonian SC)
7th Martin Smith & Mike Groom, 3737 (Wilsonian SC)
8th Jack Turnball & Emma Bambridge, 3254 (Redoubt SC)
9th Colin & Maureen Lown, 206 (Wilsonian SC)
10th Roly Thorpe & Fred Rayment, 1645 (Pevensey Bay SC)