River Exe Regatta at Topsham Sailing Club
by Mike Rice 7 Jul 2006 14:28 BST
1-2 July 2006
David Lee and Helen Woodger win Dinghy 1 at the River Exe Regatta © Mike Rice /
www.fotoboat.com
Topsham Sailing Club (TSC) hosted the sixth running of the River Exe Regatta over the weekend of 1/2 July. The regatta, run jointly by all the sailing clubs on the Exe, attracted 140 entries. Races were organised for yachts, multihulls, dinghies, and sailboards.
For the second year running the event was blessed with warm, sunny weather. The best of the sea breeze was enjoyed on Saturday, delivering two excellent races for the yachts and dinghies. An outbreak of thundery rain early on Sunday morning cleared the air but also took away the breeze until just before the close of Sunday’s racing.
The dinghy racing was organised into five fleets, according to boat type and handicap. Fleet one was a small group of multihulls from Starcross Yacht Club (SYC). Winners over the two days were John Donovan and Tony Avery in a Hurricane 5.9. On Saturday the fast handicap fleet was joined by Stevie Morrison and Ben Rhodes, recently returned from taking third place in the 49er world championships in Aix les Bains, France. They gave a superb demonstration of sailing skill and boat handling to win both races by a huge margin, but the result did not count for the overall regatta, as Morrison and Rhodes had not formally entered and were sailing “for fun”. The battle for the actual regatta points was fought by a variety of boat classes. Race 1 was won by brothers Harrison and Miles Ashton in a B14 followed by the Merlin Rockets of David Lee and Justin Eddy. Lee went on to win the second race, putting him in the overall lead for the day.
The medium handicap fleet was dominated in numbers at least by the Exe SC Comet Trio fleet, with an entry of fifteen boats. All but one were from ESC. The visiting boat was Peter Scott from Shustoke SC, crewed by his daughter Holly. Scott is the current Comet Trio national champion and finished the day as fleet leader, with a small margin over the Wayfarer of Liam and Sue McGrath of SYC.
The slow handicap fleet was dominated by the Cadets from ESC, with Jess Blick and Jamie Turl finishing the day well ahead of the fleet. Laser leader at close of play on Saturday was David Shannon of SYC .
The Hornet fleet were running an open meeting as part of the regatta, sailing on the fast handicap course. Saturday’s conditions gave them some sparkling sailing and close competition, with Richard Garry and Matt McGrath heading the fleet at the end of the first day.
The traditional regatta party, held on Saturday evening at Topsham SC, was a lively affair on a beautiful, balmy night. Even the thundery showers held off until the revelling was over.
On Sunday morning the cruisers and multihulls sailed seawards in search of breeze, to compete a single race each. In the river, all the dinghy fleets combined to sail a single 150 minute pursuit race. There was enough of a breeze at the start line, off SYC, to get everyone going reasonably well but it soon died, leaving much of the fleet drifting backwards on the now ebbing tide under an increasingly hot sun. Mercifully, as the sun reached its zenith and temperature was nudging 30 degrees, the sea breeze started to come in and the fleet slowly moved off. This was the signal for the faster boats to start to pull their way through the fleet but it was too late for them to catch the ESC Cadets of Jess Blick/Jamie Turl and Alex Horlock/Niall Lawson who had led all the way round. This confirmed Blick and Turl as the overall winners of the slow handicap fleet. Their nearest challenge on the pursuit course came from the Wayfarer of Liam and Sue McGrath, who pulled through to a commendable 3rd place, giving them the overall victory in the medium handicap fleet, over the Comet Trio of Peter and Holly Scott.
David Lee and Helen Woodger(SYC) finished 10th in their Merlin Rocket, to give them the fast handicap win over the RS200 of Rosie Sands and Andy Williams (ESC). Overall winner of the Laser fleet was David Shannon, a whisker ahead of Sarah Hickman, both of SYC.
Jon “Strangler” Williams, a former Hornet national champion, crewed by Paul McGahey won the Hornet event ahead of local sailors Richard Garry and Matt Grath.
The cruisers enjoyed two breezy and sunny races on Saturday and one somewhat less breezy and rather protracted race on Sunday. Overall winner was Chris Rhodes of ESC in a Laser 28 “Alibi”, followed by Ivan Wilkinson’s (ESC) Laser 28 “Silk Purse” and the J-24 “Tiger” of Richard Babbage (TSC)
Some excellent sailboard racing was held off the seafront at Exmouth, but the wind conditions were not suitable for kite surfing. Three slalom races were held on Saturday in a good breeze but only one on Sunday in much lighter airs. Winner was Paul Raven, with Martin Latham 2nd and Clive Pidgeon 3rd. Lady winner was Debbie Hemming.
The event closed with a huge tea party and prize giving at Topsham, rounded off by the now traditional draw for prizes donated by the event sponsor Sailsport. Thanks are due to Topsham SC and all the organisers and helpers for another great weekend of sailing. The weekend of 7 and 8 July 2007 has been provisionally booked for next year’s event, to be hosted by Starcross YC.
Full results are available on the Topsham SC website at www.topsham-sc.org.uk and photographs from the event can be seen at www.fotoboat.com