Little Red Rooster wins the Phantom Trophy 20 Nov 2014

This year the arrangements for the Phantom Trophy again broke with tradition and was sailed in the format of DIY Gate Starts. The dates were changed to try and get as many boats to enter as possible but the weekend we picked failed to have any breeze and Saturday was lost completely.

However, we managed to get three races in on the Sunday, which were very closely fought with the last race being the decider between Beaver Hunter and Lt Red Rooster. Beaver Hunter got a good start hugging the south shore followed some way behind by The Rooster, then it was decision time – at what point do you stick the bow out into the tide to make it across the river to the windward mark? With the slight breeze The Beaver went for it…

Things were looking good two thirds of the way across for the Beaver but then the wind disappeared. Rooster, being a way behind saw this and continued out of the tide, only to make the perfect crossing out to the windward mark leaving the Beaver going backwards, never to recover!

This resulted in the Little Red Rooster winning the Phantom Trophy, with Micky Wright at the helm.