Inland Championship 2009 - Alton Water Sports Centre

Report & Results
25th/26th April

The 2009 Kestrel calendar got underway in Suffolk with bright sunshine and ideal winds. The racing took place on a traditional Olympic triangles & sausages course. Race 1 started with four boats each taking turns at leading up the first beat. John & Olive came out in front with Dave & Gareth, Paul & Ian and Dusty & John chasing. John & Olive managed to stay clear ahead whilst Dave & Gareth fell back into the clutches of Paul & Ian and Dusty & John. Dave & Gareth rounded the last leeward mark on the inside and as Paul & Ian were stuck to leeward having rounded, Dusty & John tacked onto Port for the line, followed by Dave & Gareth thus allowing Paul & Ian to tack. Dave & Gareth just held second place as Dusty & John managed to grab third from Paul & Ian.

The second race got underway in a building breeze with the same four boats getting away and swapping places. This time Dusty & John managed to hold off Paul & Ian for the race win. John & Olive held off Dave & Gareth for third place.

Following a break ashore the third race got underway with the wind building to Force 4 with plenty of planing downwind to enjoy. Paul & Ian managed to make the windward mark first closely followed by Dusty and John, these two boats steadily pulled away from the rest as they battled. Paul and Ian being lucky to avoid a swim on the close reach with the boom in the water at one point, bore away heavily to enable them to get the spinnaker down and round just in front. John & Olive were fighting off Dave & Gareth again, despite opting to keep the spinnaker in the boat for a couple of reaches, to take another third.

Following a short walk to the pub, the evening was spent in the Kings Head with excellent meals and beer.

As we crawled out of tents and campers (more graceful exit from campers) on Sunday morning the water had a mirror finish and it appeared that the forecast of 3mph was going to be right. However as time passed the breeze gradually filled and by the start time there was enough to fill spinnakers. The wind direction was Southerly, down the length of the reservoir, but was very shifty giving everyone problems and much place changing in the remaining two races.

Getting away from the start of race four, John & Olive were pinching to squeeze Dave & Gareth to windward of them with Paul & Ian stuck to windward of Dave as Dusty & John to windward of all three boats had enough space to sail faster than all three. Paul & Ian slowed to be able to tack onto Port for space. John & Olive managed to make the windward mark first followed by Dusty & John. Dave & Gareth were several lengths behind unable to make any ground up. Dusty & John chipped away to take the lead and the race win.

This left Dusty & John and John & Olive to fight for first place. To win, Dusty & John did not need to win this race, but John & Olive did. Paul & Ian capable of 2nd overall if they beat John & Olive in this last race. Dave and Gareth took the lead early on, followed by John & Olive, Dusty & John and Paul and Ian. Dusty & John covered John & Olive up the left and Paul & Ian headed right to round the windward mark second. But John & Olive managed to round in third, and then making the most of shifts on the next beat took the lead. They held this to the finish as Paul & Ian having passed Dave & Gareth fended them off downwind to take second. Dusty & John having slipped to fourth were unable to make any advances on the first three boats.

This resulted in John & Olive taking the event from Dusty & John having finished on equal points and equal results, with the last race rule coming into effect. Paul & Ian taking third with Dave & Gareth fourth. Steve and Lin were fifth having been so in all five races. Kevin & Kevin were sixth overall counting four sixth places. The top three boats received framed photo’s and all competitors were given CDs with all the photo’s taken throughout the weekends racing.

A big thank you to Alton Water for hosting the event at short notice and particularly to Jeremy and Gavin for the efficient organisation and running of the racing.

Paul Jarvey.