Optimist Open at Mudeford Sailing Club
by Jane Sparks 18 Jul 2006 08:54 BST
15 July 2006
The Mudeford Sailing Club Optimist Open was blessed with perfect weather and a decent sea breeze as well as just about enough water in Christchurch Harbour for 5 hours sailing. A record entry of 68 boats, double the previous year, was divided into Gold, Silver and Regatta fleets.
The Gold and Silver sailed in the middle of the Harbour on an "outer loop" square course and Callum Ellis (Burghfield) got an early lead in race 1 and never really looked back despite a 4th in race 3 and was overall leader. Aaron Smith (Papercourt) got better and better as the day went on ending up second, with Tom Britz (Royal Lymington) having a relatively hard time in race 1 but sailing very well after that took 3rd place on countback. Henry Lloyd Williams (also RLYC) was 4th and Josh Sparks (Mudeford) 5th.
In the Silver fleet Ben Batten (RLYC) never looked threatened and secured 1st place after 3 races with Anna Greenwell (Warsash) and Dan Bullock (Burghfield) 2nd and 3rd and John Evans (Royal Victoria) 4th on countback and Robert Badderly (Wraysbury) 5th.
The Regatta fleet sailed a triangle course in a slightly more sheltered part of the Harbour. Josh Voller (Burghfield) swept the board with 4 1sts followed by Joe Burford (Fowey Gallants) and Louis Davies (Restronguet) 3rd, Ben Dowie (Burghfield) 4th and Joseph Burns (Spinnaker) 5th.
The prizes were presented by Opi National Champion Phil Sparks (who also ran registration for 3 hours in the morning) - many thanks Phil. Race Organiser James Wilson applauded all who came to race, not a single General Recall and only 2 OCS, and thanked the sponsors, H2O clothing for prizes and the JPS Group for the event T Shirts. Oh, and it was Henry Lloyd Williams' birthday and he got a cake and a full choir rendering of "Happy Birthday".