RCOD Saturday’s sailing report!!!

The Class made a collective decision to make Saturday’s race a one reef white sail event to make it equal for all

Ant (sailing Sue’s boat in her absence), made a great start and lead from the off, the Admiral then sailed over Justin (whose start timing was working off a second hand on a watch, which is clearly not as good as a stopwatch!) .

By ‘Bacon Point’, or those working in old money Creek Point or even North West Fairway, it was Justin leading, followed by the Admiral with Ant just behind, and there it stayed around the two laps of Cliff and Canewdon buoys, although distances gained and lost were interesting on the ebb tide, and quite significant shifts in direction and strength blowing down the strip, certainly no one was asking for more sail!

The trip back is where it all began, clearly the Admiral was faster down wind than Justin, so covering was the tactic used to stop the inevitable, Ant seized his chance and began the charge from the back, by using all his years of River Craft to edge ever closer, once we reached the end of Wallasea Marina, Ant made his dive towards the town to create the gap (Justin was trapped outside to windward of Edwin so would have difficulty stating proper course and soaking off to thwart Ant’s plan !?) , Ant’s end game was the line bias. As we all passed the RB line, we were probably equal, maybe even the Admiral’s nose in front to the Leward of Justin, at the Club line, three hoots were fired (those in the Club actually though racing had been cancelled, only to turn their attention from their beers to see 3 RCODS split by just a boat length and less than 2 seconds after nearly 2 hours racing…..the winner was Ant , followed by Justin and the Admiral was 3rd. Cracking race, and thoroughly enjoyed by all, very much proving you should never give up, and every decision counts, as importantly white sails with one reef and no kite is equally as much fun as the anything else.

Even better news is that was spotted afterwards in the bar, who now after some 4 years of hard work on his boat since it was given a brutal sandblasting is now ready once again to race, so we’re all looking forward to seeing Barry back on the start line