Island Barn Reservoir Sailing Club

Sunday 12th June dawned grey and murky for the 2016 Club Championship races. And it didn't really improve with racing taking place in a soft F2 southerly with some pretty presistent drizzly rain.

With a big fleet all starting at once, Race Officer Mike Storey set a long line close to the Clubhouse which turned out fairly square and bang on time the sailors set off on longish course for the conditions of 651239, comprising beat, reach, run, tightish reach, short beat, long broad reach. Mike Wong in a Laser misread the start line and was OCS but returned to restart as did Mike and Paul in the Fireball who were not over but went back just in case.

Right from the off it appeared that the right side of the beat paid and was a little one sided initially as the wind slowly veered over the course of the morning. For the second race the weather had brightened a little (at least the marks across the reservoir were now visible) and a shorter course of 6X19 was set, with the beat now a little squarer, allowing most boats to get in 4 laps. This proved a curse for the mid fleet boats who were set off onto a 4th lap to find the wind easing considerably as they progressed up the final beat and slowing their progress considerably. The faster boats were fortunate to finish before the worst of the lull and the very slowest boats also benefitted somewhat from being finished a lap early.

In the end, no surprises in the results given the conditions with Gareth Griffiths sailing very fast to win both races by nearly a minute on corrected time. Peter Curtis and Fiona Fardon in the RS500 had 2 convincing second places in sub optimal conditions for them. Paul Wright Anderson in an Aero 9 was 3rd in the first race but lost out in the second and overall to James Curtis in an RS300. Dave Clark won the Veterans series.

Overall results are here, including the age related handicap results.