RS 10th Anniversary Race

250 boats on the one line, TheDailySail was there to report on the spectacle

Conditions did not look good on Saturday for the start of the RS 10th Birthday celebrations at Hayling Island Sailing Club - a light breeze and a heavy mist shrouded the 250 odd RS boats as they headed out to the bay for the first day of racing.

The race course was featureless, with land out of sight and RS dinghies stretched to all visible horizons. First up were individual fleet races, all sailing on a big, staggered, two beat course which was finally bathed in sunshine as the RS 800s, the last fleet, got to the windward mark.

The cost of the sun breaking through was a 40 degree windshift to the right which made the course a bit lopsided, but plenty of fun as various classes mixed it up as the faster boats caught up the RS Fevas who were first off.

With a gentle southeasterly sea breeze established and a brilliant blue sky, everything was set for the big spectacle of the weekend - the single start Anniversary Race at 4pm.

Three committee boats were used to set the line for the 250 boats, with the course as before, but with an extended run into the finish - which was just off the clubhouse in the harbour.

In the quest to give everyone some fair racing, the separate fleets congregated at various parts of the line. The Fevas, 200s and 400s were down at the starboard end, the 600s, 700s and 800s and the K6s milled around the left hand side of the line. The plan originally was to give the starboard end a bit of bias to it, helping the slower classes mix it. This tactic didn’t prove successful and unfortunately the sight of the massed ranks of RS sailors battling it out on a single start line was a little diluted.

That said, the committee did an excellent job of coping with the task in hand, albeit with some comedy on the VHF:

Starboard end boat: “What do you want to do with boats that are over? Over.”
Centre boat: “If you can start taking numbers, that should be fine. Over.”
SEB: “Well, that’s starting to look like a lot of the RS 400s are over. Over.”
CB: “Do the best you can….Over”
Seb: “That’s now most of the 400s over. Over.”



Anyway, BANG! And they’re off. First to look rosy was the 600 of Christian Reynolds, who tacked off onto port from the central committee boat and had a nice jump on the other 249 boats.

Greg Wells and Caroline Lichfield in an 800 looked in good shape halfway up the beat, however Wells said later that not all had gone to plan at the start: “We were going for a port end start and at one point we were going to go for a port tack flyer, but we bottled it. We couldn’t get round the committee boat, so we had to gybe round and dip a few transoms, but we still came out smelling of roses from that end of the line.”

The breeze then built slightly which enabled the trapeze boats to start chewing up the beat, the 800 of Haworth and Aston looked good coming across from the centre of the course to cover the 100 (ish) boats over on the right.

The real winners were the guys on the left hand side who got a nice shift and increase in pressure towards the end of the beat and it was go to be touch and go between Andy White, coming in on the port layline in his 700 and Neil Baker and Chris Dodds in an 800 already set up on the starboard layline.

I suppose you would be a bit nervous coming in on the port layline in a 250 boat fleet, but it was Andy White who tacked and rounded first(below), 10 seconds or so before the 800. Plenty of cheers went up from the assembled ribs as the ultimate bar-propping-sailing-story went to the 700 sailor.



White, practising his ultimate bar-propping-sailing story on TheDailySail later described the first part of the race: “I came off the port end and the whole plan was to try to keep clear air, I went out to the layline and tacked, really just to keep out of the way because it’s such a massive fleet. I might have missed the odd shift, but it’s worked out well and was good for the 700 to keep the speed on.

The first reach looked to play into the hands of the 800s. “I really wanted to be first round the windward mark,” continues White, “as I thought it would be game over after then, but downwind I managed to overtake the 800 again. In the 700 you can’t tight reach very well, because you can’t play the main - you only have so many hands. But fortunately the 800 had to take his kite down as well before the gybe mark.”

As things got busier and tighter at the windward mark, there were a few clunks and clangs, who shall remain nameless, principally because in the throng it was quite hard to make out who was doing what to who.

At the bottom of the first run the race was shaping up to be a battle between White, Steve Irish and Martin Gotrel in an 800 and Neil Robinson in a 700.

Things were to become a little trickier for the front runners as the race leading RIB, which was helping the sailors identify the next mark ran out of fuel. White, managed to get find the right bottom mark, but was understandably getting a little verbal with anyone who was in earshot, including TheDailySail duo in our RIB. Fortunately we absolved ourselves by towing the broken RIB, calming the sailors down, then selflessly handing over our spare can of fuel. The race could go on!

We then checked our fuel situation and realised, that with the spare can gone, we would soon be waving to passers-by for help too. As we left the race course, the leaders were nearing the end of their second beat, with boats spread like a giant multi-coloured conger all the way back to the windward mark, a fantastic sight.

Back on shore and we didn’t have to wait long for Andy White to get the gun, so was he going to take the victory on handicap? “Well the 800s give us time, so it’s just about everyone else I have to worry about!” said White, packing his boat up. “I tried not to look back too much, just really concentrate on the other 700. I thought the 800s would all pass me at some point.”

White’s biggest disappointment of the day was hitting the beach to find no-one there to help with the trolley for his 700. “My wife’s pregnant so she’s in the clear...!” said White before tucking into the first pint of the day. The view from the balcony looked pretty good, with boats streaming down the channel to the finish, and those already finished, sitting pretty on handicap as the breeze started to fade in the early evening sun.



Final results (placed):

	Class	Sail No	Helm	Crew	Club
1	RS700	900	Andy White	N/A	Stokes Bay
2	RS700	744	Neil Robinson	N/A	HISC
3	RS800	1058	Steve Irish	Martin Gotrel	Draycote
4	RS800	985	David Sayce	Chris Doe	HISC
5	RS700	823	Andrew Irons	N/A	TBC
6	RS700	750	Andrew Peake	N/A	Bough Beech
7	RS800	804	Neil Baker	Chris Dodds	HISC
8	RS800	904	Greg Wells	Caroline Lichfield	HISC
9	RS700	788	Jason Belben	N/A	Stokes Bay
10	RS800	843	Rob Watson	James Holmes	Royal Lymington YC
11	RS800	1061	Clive Goodwin	Philip Goodwin	Brightlingsea
12	RS700	882	Jonathan Heissig	N/A	Lymington Town SC
13	RS800	1057	Alan Olive	Jane Norris	Stokes Bay
14	RS700	893	Keith Willis	N/A	Lymington Town SC
15	RS700	798	Nick Rawlings	N/A	HISC
16	RS700	875	Paul Bayliss	N/A	HISC
17	RS700	861	Eddie Gatehouse	N/A	CYC
18	RS700	844	Grahm Simmonds	N/A	HISC
19	RS700	891	Steve Butcher	N/A	HISC
20	RS800	1064	C.J. Haworth	Stuart Aston	BCYC
21	RS400	976	David Lenz	Victoria Symmers	Lymington
22	RS700	763	Andy Riddington	N/A	Draycote SC
23	RS700	766	Alex Koukourakis	N/A	Eastbourne SC
24	RS800	1000	Michael Lennon	Emma White	HISC
25	RS700	806	Nicky Griffin	N/A	HISC
26	RS400	1221	Owen Modral	David Ellis	TBC
27	RS400	896	C Jennings	Ed Nicklin	Burghfield
28	RS800	1015	Katie Archer	Kate Rooke	TBC
29	K6	102	Martin Wadhams	Amanda Davies	Lymington Town YC
30	RS800	878	Sam Neal	Mandy Bretherton	TBC
31	RS800	1010	Ollie Page	James Perry	Lancing/Grafham
32	RS800	1046	Neil Harrison	Richard Barlingham	Hamble
33	RS800	808	Daniel Tregaskes	Polly Tregaskes	Restronguet
34	RS800	847	Justin Deal	Sarah Marriott	Datchet SC
35	RS700	828	Ian Gorringe	N/A	HISC
36	RS800	1044	Barrie Edgington	Ian Lovering	HISC
37	RS400	1225	Paul Bowen	Shaun Kellett	Gurnard SC
38	K6	148	Mark Darling	John Ronmonger	HISC
39	RS800	931	Tom Jeffcoate	Toby Wincer	Sheffield Uni SC
40	RS800	860	Andrew Jeffries	Allyson Day	Eastbourne
41	RS600	979	Ian Marshall	N/A	RAFSA/Oxford SC
42	RS400	1182	Phil Jackson	Gerard Barron	Parkstone YC
43	RS800	918	Ian Gore	Andy Pickerell	U River YC
44	RS700	869	Leigh Albrecht	N/A	Queen Mary SC
45	RS700	890	Ian Swann	N/A	HISC
46	RS700	811	Matt Coleman	N/A	Weston SC
47	RS700	854	Tim Polglase	N/A	HISC
48	RS800	1050	Matt Adams	John Date	Stokes Bay
49	RS800	892	David Pike	Robert Pike	Eastbourne
50	K6	132	Bill Masterman	Dan Mountifield	HISC
51	RS800	925	Simon Jenkins	Neil Arnott	Eastbourne Sovereign
52	RS800	1002	Keith Walker	Paul Jones	HISC
53	RS600	895	Griff Tanner	N/A	Datchet SC
54	RS400	1222	Jom Baldwin	Jonny Backhouse	Notts County SC
55	RS700	885	David Cummins	N/A	Queen Mary SC
56	RS800	883	Kate Gillow	Simon Gillow	Draycote SC
57	K6	126	Peter Kirkby	Richard Barker	Queen Mary SC
58	RS700	787	Angus Chisholm	N/A	HISC
59	RS400	835	Tom Halhead	Veryan Ridler	Bristol Cointhian
60	RS600	930	Rob Chaplin	N/A	Queen Mary SC
60	RS800	989	Ben Schooling	Peter Nicholson	Datchet/Helensburgh
62	RS700	769	Mark Pollington	N/A	Burghfield SC
63	RS400	1219	Mark Reddington	TBC	Bartley SC
64	RS200	854	Lee Sydenham	Anne Vaudry	Stokes Bay
65	RS200	844	John Blundell	Chris Blundell	Hallamshire
66	RS600	709	Andy Heissig	N/A	Lymington Town SC
67	RS600	980	Christian Reynolds	N/A	Locks SC
68	RS800	987	Neil Bond	Jo Bond	Stokes Bay
69	RS300	421	Richard Peacock	N/A	Bartley
70	RS800	916	Babs Emmans	Roland Emmans	Weston SC
71	RS200	491	John Greenland	Pippa Williams	HISC
72	RS800	991	Malcolm Streeton	Miles Roebuck	HISC
73	RS200	753	David Giles	Fiona Clarke	Weirwood SC
74	RS400	1217	John Cooper	Becci Wigley	Lymington
75	RS600	642	Tom Low	N/A	Oxford SC
76	RS200	845	James Stewart	Sam Littlejohn	Stokes Bay
77	RS400	1205	Chris Bailey	Matt Bailey	Bartley SC
78	RS200	927	Trudie Danbury	Graeme Danbury	Bristol Corinthian YC
79	RS400	812	Paul Oakley	Mariea Oakey	Portchester
80	RS400	1165	Nick Peters	Lana Driscoll	HISC
81	RS700	857	Andrew Streeter	N/A	HISC
82	RS400	1201	Bill Handley	Lynda Handley	Swanage SC
82	K6	150	Bob Pearson	Gill Pearson / Sarah Costin	Carsington SC
84	RS400	476	Chris Gowers	June Riley	Port Dinorwig
85	RS400	898	Chris Jordan	Gillian Jordan	Burghfield SC
86	RS400	1180	Ian Robson	Sandy Johnson	Aldeburgh YC
87	RS400	548	Tim Weeden	Melanie Miller	Thorney Island SC
88	RS300	391	Joel Burchett	N/A	Locks SC
89	RS200	900	Hamish Calder	Severine Jones	Warsash
90	RS800	1055	Rory Sharvill	James Cooke	Downs
91	RS800	845	Graham Adamson	Lee Martin	Stone
92	RS800	900	Chris Powles	TBC	HISC
93	RS200	739	Paul Dorer	Andrew Robertson	Bowmoor
94	RS200	872	Harry Roome	Prue Roome	TBC
95	RS400	1121	Paul Hilliar	Toby Ashton	Frensham Pond SC
96	RS400	429	Ian Maclean	Jeremy Climas	Royal Forth
97	RS200	954	Matt Davies	Dottie Cormack	TBC
98	RS800	1019	Tim Cutsforth	Sally Cooper	Felpham SC
99	RS600	879	Matthew Connor	N/A	TBC
100	RS200	852	Patrick Altoft	Deborah Greenland	Ripon SC
101	RS200	816	Martyn Jones	Clare Rowbottom	Itchenor SC
102	RS200	740	Vince Horey	Jane Wade	King George
103	RS200	858	Jonathan Lewis	Mad Milly Parsons	Burghfield SC
104	RS400	1057	John McLaren	Anne McLaren	Brightlingsea
105	RS400	1228	Greg O'Brien	Pete Rowley	Bartley SC
106	RS400	528	Roy Sievers	Louisa Rump	Thorney Island SC
107	RS400	1008	Neil Miller	Annabelle Miller	Queen Mary SC
108	RS400	893	Tim Hall	Jessica Roberts	Port Dinorwig
109	RS600	900	Ali Wyatt	N/A	Bristol Corinthian YC
110	RS600	826	David Nunn	N/A	Datchet SC
111	RS400	1134	Howard Farbrother	Louise Hosken	Datchet SC
112	RS200	815	Mick Wright	Hannah Grice	Maylandsea Bay SC
113	RS200	777	Peter Vincent	Laura Newnham	Bristol Corinthian YC
114	RS200	837	Timothy Gray	Wendy Jane Gray	Staunton Harold
115	RS200	821	Colin Staite	Jane Sutor	Bartley SC
116	RS200	901	Ian Pickard	Noelle Vidal	Bristol Corinthian YC
117	RS200	929	Gael Pawson	Melissa Heppell	TBC
118	RS800	858	Richard Yerbury	Vicky Wilkinson	Grafham SC
119	RS200	880	Sarah Allen	TBC	Royal Southern
120	RS200	859	Phil Robin	Sophie Robin	HISC
121	RS200	974	Simon Howell	James Rodgers	Wembley
122	RS200	926	Chris Darling	Helen Williams	Itchenor SC
123	RS200	602	Christopher Clarke	Oliver Herve	Thorpe Bay
124	RS200	846	Jeremy Stephens	Adam Poole	Penzance SC
125	RS800	1051	Jon Partridge	Tim Sinyth	Netley
126	RS400	589	James Downer	Jess Olden	Gurnard SC
127	RS200	660	James Weatherstone	Hilary Weatherstone	HISC
128	RS300	471	James Winfield	N/A	Locks SC
129	RS400	1213	Demo Dave	Ben Saynor	LDC
130	RS200	651	Douglas Maxwell	TBC	Wembley SC
131	RS300	501	Andrew Beynon	N/A	HISC
132	RS200	855	Ian Andrew	Elizabeth Andrew	HISC
133	RS200	920	Mark Harrison	TBC	Gurnard SC
134	RS200	449	Vanda Young	Jonathan Vowett	Littleton SC
135	RS300	479	Steve Cook	N/A	Stokes Bay
136	RS300	431	Chris McDonald	N/A	Bough Beech
137	RS300	475	Chris Hart	N/A	Port Talbot SC
138	RS300	318	Robert Eastwood	N/A	Porchester SC
139	RS200	369	Christopher Pilling	Natasha Adams	Waveney YC
140	RS400	1227	David Charlton	Celia Charlton	Brightlingsea SC
141	RS400	703	Stuart Coles	Claire Oliver	Emsworth Slipper
142	RS600	775	John Clifton	N/A	Weir Wood
143	RS400	410	William Hearn	Robert Hepburn	Parkstone YC
144	RS600	909	Peter Sanders	N/A	Queen Mary SC
145	RS400	824	Paul Clark	Andrew Raper	Brighton
146	RS Vareo	239	Paul Craft	N/A	TCYC
147	RS600	920	Fred Lord	N/A	Portchester SC
148	RS400	1153	Simon Notley	Adam Notley	Mengham SC
149	RS400	944	Winston Lord	Vicki Lord	Portchester SC
150	RS200	938	Charlotte Cooper	Ben Cooper	Wraysbury Lake SC
151	RS200	835	Charlie Muir	Jane Sands	Datchet SC
152	RS200	429	Sarah Auckland	David Charlesworth	HISC
153	RS700	808	Richard Rous	N/A	Queen Mary SC
154	RS700	777	Stewart Speer	N/A	CVLSC
155	RS600	719	Jonathan Farwell	N/A	Datchet SC
156	RS200	227	Chris Hawkes	Sarah Robinson	Bartley SC
157	RS Vareo	207	David Bates	N/A	Papercourt
158	RS400	693	Jon Smith	Debbie Thomas	Queen Mary SC
159	RS600	921	Damon Bower	N/A	Thorney Island SC
160	RS800	886	Matt Critchley	Graeme Sien	Stokes Bay
161	RS400	1073	Adam Oliver	David Brent	TBC
162	RS400	567	Jonathan Wilburn	Megs Crabtree	Thorney Island
163	RS Vareo	172	Hugh Wray-McCann	N/A	Teign Corinthian
164	RS400	1027	Andrew Crowther	TBC	Grafham Water
165	RS700	840	Daniel Azzopardi	N/A	Stokes Bay
166	RS400	978	Roger Saynor	Ben Clarke	RNSA
167	RS400	950	Neil Peacock	Sue Peacock	Bartley
168	RS400	678	Tim Smith	Ruth Appleby	Weston SC
169	RS800	1066	Matthew Amiss	Becky Gardner	Weston SC
170	RS400	635	Caroline Marriage	Ann Lane	Queen Mary SC
171	RS400	810	Richard Arthur	Susan Arthur	Llangorse
172	RS400	522	Christopher Hitchman	Stuart Roberts	Bartley SC
173	RS200	772	Tom Hewitson	Jo Hewitson	Royal Northern/Clyde
174	RS400	733	James Ross	Nev Watson	Hamble River
175	RS600	801	Mike Ford	N/A	Langstone SC
175	RS400	1090	Simon Jackson	Laura Collister	Weston
177	RS800	1013	Joe Turnbull	Rob Britton	Stokes Bay
178	RS700	741	Ned McNulty	N/A	Stokes Bay
179	RS800	1012	Richard Bray	Brian O'Connell	HISC
180	RS800	864	Adrian Coatsworth	Julia Jenkins	Alton Water SC
181	RS700	855	Andy Roberson	N/A	HISC