Early Sprints Series Concludes

Published 13:48 on 14 Jun 2022

35 boats took part in one or more of the 12 races in our Early Sprints Series which ended last weekend. Under our scoring system it's the boat with the lowest points total from their best 9 results that wins and, as had seemed likely from the early results, this was Peter McKerchar sailing a Lightning who scored 19 points. Second overall was Kevan Watkins on 30 pts with Jolyon Western close behind with 38 pts in 3rd. Jolyon's younger brother and our ex-Commodore Ivan Western came 4th, just 3 pts behind on 41. You can read all the results here.

Despite the sometimes challenging winds, the series has been particularly popular this year where we have seen some really close on boat-to-boat racing and frequent (sometimes extraordinary) changes of fortune.

It has also been great to see so many juniors joining in the Sprints in their Toppers with several notable performances. Hugh Williams deserves a special mention having achieved a "top 3" result in each of the races last weekend - a performance that gained him 6th place overall in the Series. Four other juniors came in the top 12: Isla Edward (7), Sam Holben (8), Layla Shaer (11) and Hugh Tyers (12). The experiment of running Sprints in parallel with the Oppie & Topper Club clearly worked and we look forward to seeing these talented young sailors at future Club races. Don't forget we have a 9-race Late Sprints Series beginning August 28th!

Sprints are probably the most challenging events for our Race Teams as they require suitably short Triangle-Sausage-Triangle courses to be set for a wide range of boats using our Club moveable marks, with three 20-minute races being run in close succession. The standard achieved by these teams this season has been first class, even though they have faced some difficult shifting wind strengths and directions. Well done and thank you all.

Last updated 11:01 on 28 March 2024