Patience required

Light winds dominated the third round of the Raymarine Warsash Spring Series

Light wind conditions dominated the third weekend of the Raymarine Warsash Spring Series on Sunday 29 March 2009. The calm that enveloped the Solent overnight remained until after midday when a trickle of southwesterly breeze filtered in towards the entrance to Southampton Water where the sportsboat classes were waiting patiently.

The 20 Laser SB3s that had stayed out during the long postponement were rewarded with a two lap course. The wind slowly built during the race but also shifted towards the west. Mike Budd on Zimmer had to work hard for victory. David Cummings helming Rumbleflurg had his best result so far in second with Jo Lloyd and Sue Lloyd Antonelli in Robina third. CRO Peter Knight decided to extend the next race to three laps. A wind shift in the last minute gave rise to a general recall and the fleet were put under a Black Flag Rule. Only Team Green (Libby Greenhalgh) was caught the wrong side of the line at the restart and this will drop them down the overall standings until a discard is allowed. Again Mike Budd proved to be too good for the rest of the fleet and he took his second gun of the day, moving up to second overall on 33 points. Geoff Carveth on Creativity leads on 27 points but was sailing with a very light crew and could only manage an eighth and fourth scoreline on the day.

On the second White Group line CRO Jon Spencer completed three races for the J/80s and Hunter 707s. There were triple victories in both classes. Scaramouche (Matt Gagnon) had the edge over Lutine Belle (Liz Lotz and Peter Young) in each of the 707 races but it was always close enough to provide good racing. In the J/80s, Joystick (Vic Gregory and Rob Larke) is stringing together a very impressive set of results with seven first places and one second. Their main competition at present comes from Charles Somerset in Loudwater. Until the third week of the series he had posted no worse than a third place but on Sunday he had a bad day, being scored OCS in one race and 12th in another before recovering to second place in the final race. Julian Bates on Bjorn Slippy has been showing a steady improvement, posting a third, second and fourth which moves him up the leaderboard to second.

In Black Group only IRC4 completed a race, starting from the Laser SB3 line on a short windward/leeward around East Knoll. Provisional results show 2XS (Andriu McCormack) fastest on the water but The Flying Fish (Kathy and Rupert Smalley) followed home a minute later giving the smaller Laser 28 the win, followed by Blink, the new Link 30 one design, and Sigma 33 Sixes and Sevens.

Next weekend sees the start of the Spring Championship on Saturday for 'Big Boats', 45 footers and 40.7s. The 13-strong mixed handicap section includes J/133s, J/122s and the TP52 Cutting Edge. Later in the Championship Warsash Sailing Club is pleased to welcome three boats in the J/80 class from Toe in the Water, the initiative which aims to inspire the lives of men and women from the three services who have suffered traumatic injuries, racing on equal terms with their able-bodied contemporaries. The Raymarine Warsash Spring Series continues on Sunday 5 April.