Leigh & Lowton Sailing Club Tipsy Icicle Series

by Richard Catchpole 24 Mar 10:23 GMT

Despite severely adverse weather conditions, the Tipsy Icicle Series once again provided great dinghy racing for NW dinghy sailors. 150 sailors competed across 11 weekends in gentle breezes, strong gusty winds, ice and floods.

The last two weekends provided more "normal" conditions to allow competitors to enjoy F2-4 conditions for a change.

There were some familiar faces at the front of the fleet but also many who were competing in the series for the first time. Home club Leigh & Lowton were well represented of course but also visitors from Bolton, Delph, Bassenthwaite, Hollingworth and West Riding amongst others.

Asymmetric

LLSC sailors Dave Exley and Nigel Hall's RS400 fought back from last year's temporary toppling off the top spot, by overcoming Hamish Gledhill and Ross Southwell (West Riding) on the last weekend. Chris Pickles crewed by young Evie Pickles (Bassenthwaite) battled through the tough conditions to pick up 3rd spot. Alastair Coates (LLSC) was the best of the D1s, coming home in 4th.

Handicap

The handicap fleet went down to the final weekend also. A final race bullet from Andy Flitcroft (Bolton), combined with a black flag result for Dave Southwell and Phil Wishart (LLSC) sealed the series win for Andy in his Supernova. Also from Bolton, Matt Watkiss sailed a consistent series to take 3rd.

Lasers

Solo Winning the series with 2 weekends to go is unusual in the Laser fleet but that's exactly what Paul Heath (LLSC) achieved with some great sailing over the early part of the series. He was pegged back a little later on by Gordon Riddell (Delph) and Stuart Belfield (LLSC), and particularly on the final 2 weekends by the returning Ollie Blackburn (LLSC). He will be one to watch for next year after his return to the club.

Malcolm Blackburn (LLSC) showed the "youngsters" up in the Solo fleet, with only top 2 places to count. Dave Kelsall (LLSC) sailed very well to pick up 2nd and the battle for 3rd was tense on the final weekend with Andrew Roberts (LLSC) winning out.

Juniors

Molly Haslam (Delph) persisted across the series to win the junior fleet. Unfortunately the fleet was less well attended than it has been in the past.

Full results of the Tipsy Icicle Series 2025 can be found here.