Southport Sailing Club Frostbite Series - Day 1
by Matthew Harris 13 Nov 2014 14:31 GMT
9 November 2014
The Southport Frostbite Series starts © Tony Leeson
Last Sunday marked the start of Southport Sailing Clubs Frostbite winter series. The first race was longer than expected but provided close racing for all of the 20 boats (from 4 clubs) entered.
The start line was quite bunched due to the awkward westerly wind direction but the fleet got away cleanly. Places changed and gains and losses could be made by picking the right street to sail up or down. In the end Eddy Thomas (Phantom) won the race with 2nd (Chris Parker – Graduate), 3rd (Greg Thomas - GP14) and 4th (Ben Hill - Graduate) covered by just 11 seconds on handicap. Lunch followed which was a lovely chicken stew before going out for the second race.
The second race saw a tweak of the line to try to encourage boats to migrate away from the bunching at the starboard end. This resulted in a brave/stupid port flyer from Matt Harris (Phantom) that managed to pip ahead of the starboard tack boats. Again racing amongst the GP14, Graduates and Phantoms was close at the end with Eddy taking 1st, Chris 2nd, Matt 3rd and Greg 4th.
Further down the fleet saw numerous Juniors competing for the Jet Trophy (best Junior) and good racing for all with everyone having some close to them on the results.
The series runs from now until Christmas (21st December) and is divided into separate AM and PM series'. After Christmas the Snowflake series takes its place and runs in the same AM/PM format until March 15th 2015. Racing costs £2 per day and starts at 11:00, all sailors are welcome and we usually have a mixed fleet of around 20 boats.
Results and more information can be found at www.southportsailingclub.org.uk.