UK - Chew Valley Open

26 April 2013

The first open meeting of the year was held at Chew Valley. With a variable forecast 13 boats made the trip. Sharing with the Scorpions worked well, with 3 back to back races quick-fire on the Saturday to start proceedings.

After the previous committee boat had sunk in a storm, the race officer Peter Sherwin explained that if the expected winds came through early, the replacement committee boat would head for the beach and we would be starting from the club line - luckily that didn't happen.

Tom Gillard and Simon Potts demonstrated a disdain of the fleet by disappearing in the first race - a trend that they were to continue throughout the day, though their lead was halved in each race as the rest of the fleet began to wake up.

Elsewhere in the first race, Vince Horey and Richard Anderton generated a recall, and then got off to a ropey start, but managed to recover through the race, stealing 3rd place from Dave Wade and DC in the last hundred yards - Kevin Hope and Russell Thorn sailed a great race to finish 2nd.

Race 2 was again recalled, but after the second start it saw a re-run of the top 3, with Derian Scott and Andy Scott fighting hard to win 4th.

Race 3 got away cleanly, and after a poor start, Vince and Richard moved from 12th to 6th after the fleet sailed each other high on the second reach. They continued to push forward, again clinching 2nd in the closing stages of the race.

As Sunday dawned, it became apparent that the day was going to be 'blustery', and after checking all the weather sites, we turned up at Chew Valley to find the Scorpions already packing up, and the Race Office kindly let us off the hook.

Overall Results: