3 May 2013
Seven-boat fleet inaugurates racing
The Flying Fifteen fleet provided the Race Committee, high tide was at 16:00 and the XCWeather forecast had got it right with predictions of SSE wind when the Fireball fleet initiated their 2013 DBSC Tuesday Night Dinghy Series.
Defending Tuesday night champions Stephen Oram and Noel Butler were there, as was Class Chairman Neil Colin with regular crew Margaret Casey. A relative newcomer to Tuesday nights was Conor Clancy, sailing with an unidentified crew, as far as this correspondent was concerned. Also making a rare but welcome appearance was Stephen Campion, sailing with Louise McKenna.
Three quarters of the way up the first beat a very premature assessment might have suggested we were sailing on the wrong night as Louis Smyth led the fleet with his rivals split left and right, offshore and inshore. Butler & Oram were back in third with Conor Clancy separating the pair! However, in the final approach to the weather mark, Clancy got through to lead and while he kept a wary eye on his competitors he was never headed thereafter.
Smyth & Bradley held off Butler & Oram across the top reach of the trapezoid course and for a reasonable section of the subsequent leg. However, with both crews working hard to make use of the wind and waves the younger combination got ahead but unusually for them did not streak away from the rest of the fleet. Behind the leading three boats, Colin & Casey and Frank Miller & Grattan Donnelly led the chase.
On the second beat the majority of the fleet had tacked immediately at Mark 4 to head to sea. However, not everyone stuck with that game plan as first Colin & Casey and then Mary Chambers & Brenda McGuire peeled off to the right. Smyth/Bradley closed the gap on the lead two, hailing starboard on Butler/Oram when they headed inshore for the second turning of the weather mark. Clancy & crew were clear ahead but by a shortened margin.
For the run down to Mark 4, the fleet initially went out to sea again on starboard tack. Miller/Donnelly stayed inshore of everyone and at one stage looked very healthy indeed. Colin/Casey went further out to sea and seemed to lose the distance they had gained on the earlier part of the leg. Chambers/McGuire and McKenna/Campion sailed a much more "middle of the road" course and the former combination was rewarded by rounding Mark 4 in 4th place. However, while the lead two were never in trouble, the fleet actually condensed somewhat, creating a much shortened finishing sequence for the class.
Race 1 Results:
1st Conor Clancy & A. N. Other, 150** 2nd Noel Butler & Stephen Oram 15061 3rd Louis Smyth & Cormac Bradley, 15007
