Who has the fastest survival mode, was the order of the day at Rollesby Broad this Sunday; following a delayed start to observe two minutes silence at 11 am.
The singlehanders made up the majority of the sailors on the water, with Chris Toothill rightly leading the fleet round the course in his Phantom in both races. However an ability to stay upright was more important than outright speed and Ian Ayres led (all be it by a long way) a trio of Solos to handicap victory with Phil Alison and John Saddington having survived the rather scary long run second and third.
A zig-zag downwind with several gybes proved a more stable course in race two, favouring the Lasers of Keith Sykes, who worked really hard in the later stages to catch Stuart Highfield, as they enjoyed some great planing reaches; neither however could quite get far enough ahead of Ayres as he won by a handful of seconds.
In race one for the multisails, Dave Houghton & John Symonds put their Wayfarer into hyper-drive by flying their spinnaker and left the opposition lagging far behind. The only other finishers were Daniel Harvey & Andy Smith with a somewhat more cautious but very seaman like performance. When Houghton & Symonds performed their ‘once a year’ capsize before the start of race two the rest of the fleet elected to stay ashore, only to watch them very nearly repeat the feat on lap two!
‘once a year’
Multisails
Race 1 (5 entries)
1 Dave Houghton & John Symonds (Wayfarer)
2. Daniel Harvey & Andy Smith (Wayfarer)
Race 2 (2)
1 Dave Houghton & John Symonds (Wayfarer)
Single Handers
Race 1 (11 entries)
1. Ian Ayres (Solo)
2. Phil Alison (Solo)
3. John Saddington (Solo)
Race 2 (8)
1. Ian Ayres (Solo)
2. Keith Sykes (Laser)
3. Stuart Highfield (Laser)