Saturday 28th June 1030 am start till your ready to stop, informal I.O.M racing, all muck in to sort courses etc, just turn up, no entry fee, no prizes, but a great chance to do a final tune against other race boats before the Ranking, proper starts by the way.

It was tricky, shifty, gusty conditions for the 14 skippers who took part in Lincoln Radio Sailing Club’s I.O.M Summer series round 5.

Simon Fairman from Manor Park joined us for the day, to work up his Alioth Mk3 and showed good speed at times, recording three 3^rd place finishes on the gloriously sunny day.

A big thank you goes to Greg Codling, assistant RO and Roger Crates, RO. They set a predominantly windward/leeward course, angled to the West bank, with the start line having an inner distance mark and a choice of 3 outer distance marks, making it possible to rapidly realign the start line for a port bias as the wind oscillated. There were barely two consecutive races with the same start line, it was that unpredictable.

A fast Mick Chamberlain won the first race ahead of Darin Ballington, recently returned from his brilliant 3^rd place at the Marblehead Worlds, and Martyn Aspinall took 3^rd.  Mick and Martyn have some head scratching to do, where did the boat speed go after that?

Darin B has found his IOM form again and went on to win the next 3 races, winning a total of 6 out for the twelve races sailed and taking the days series overall with 19 points. In a distant second place was Roger Crates with 3 wins and a 29 point total, closely followed by Rob Wilson on 32.

As always there was close and enjoyable racing throughout the fleet, including for our octogenarian of the day, Mick Cooper. Happy Birthday Mick and best wishes from all of us at the club.

Report by Roger Crates.

Results , very well done Darin for the win .

A turnout of 5 skippers arrived at the lake for round three  of the DF 95’s.

On exiting the car it became apparent that setting up the A rig the night before was, as feared, a little shortsighted. With a gusty wind, consistency was going to be key and although A rig did look a possibility in the lulls the fleet erred on the conservative side and all started on B Rig.

Roger B stood in as an excellent OD and arrived early to get everything set up and ready for the 10am start.

R1 and Sam Parker left the blocks at breakneck pace, showing good speed and negotiating through the tacks with ease. Winning the race, followed by Roger and Mick Cooper. Sam came in and tweaked his rig, much to his consternation during R2.

R2 and Roger B was getting used to the conditions, taking the win from Paul K and Mick C in 3rd. Sam blamed his tweeking (not twerking) for his 5th place, Colin T was close to the leaders in 4th.

R3 and Sam had another tweek (still no twerking) and rediscovered his pace to take the race. Paul K got over enthusiastic when adjusting his rig, resulting in the loss of adjustment of the Cunningham. A quick (permanent) fix resulted in ugly creases in the main and a poor set up. It was time to think about swapping to A rig for me (perhaps wait until the tea break). 

R4 and it was Mick C’s turn to win ahead of Paul K and Sam P.

R5 was to be the last race before the tea break. Paul K (having now decided change to A rig) won meaning that after 5 races we had had 4 different winners, with Sam showing the best form with 2 wins.

During the break Sam, Colin and Paul all opted to change to A rig, whilst Roger and  Mick enjoyed a coffee and stuck with B.

The next few races showed how the well and equally the DF95’s handle the different rig sizes. B rig was quicker than A upwind, but A had an advantage off wind. Roger was the only skipper that stuck with B for the whole session, and was usually the first boat to the Windward mark, only for the A rigs hoping to avoid any nose diving, and chip away at him offwind.

Paul K started to find some consistency with the A rig winning 5 of the 8 remaining races. Colin T was well in the mix and was extremely close to the podium positions.

Thanks to Roger for filling in the OD role, keeping us on time and for completing 13 races all in good spirits with lots learnt…

Report by Paul Kelly .

Wow, what an intense and enjoyable morning’s racing, June 1^st, at Scotland farm was, for the 14 skippers who opted to race.

Thank you first, to Pete Walters, our OOD for setting a windward /leeward course on the east bank and to Roger Bowtle, our assistant OOD who very kindly volunteered to take control of the starts, which on a windy, gusty, shifty day was a challenge in itself.

The forecast 12 to14 Knots gusting into the 20’s arrived by 10am and all skippers opted for the B rig.

We are very happy to welcome a new IOM skipper to the fleet, Brian Reeves, welcome Brian. He had a very commendable 6^th place finish in race 10 and 7^th place finish in race 6, very good for a first time out.

Well done Brian.

Race 1 was convincingly won by Rob Wilson, who unfortunately developed winch issues and had to retire after race 4, with Tim Hand in 2^nd and Mick Chamberlin in 3^{rd  place w}ith RogerC finishing in 8^th place.

RogerC was seen rapidly retuning his Venti and it must have paid off, because he went on to win race2 from Pete Walters 2^nd with a consistent MickC in 3^rd.

MickC showed real form in race 3, winning the race ahead of RogerC 2^nd and Darin Ballington in 3^rd.

The wind continued to be a gusty South Westerly with significant left, right shifts catching out a lot of skippers and making getting off the start line a challenge.

Race 4 saw RogerC find some pace and he went on to win the next 4 races.

With the strong wind and the speed of the boats, racing was frenetic with 11 races sailed, including having a coffee break after race 5.

Not bad for a morning’s fun.

MickC went on to win again in race 8 but overall his consistency was not there, going on to finish the day 4th on 39 points.

The final overall results being RogerC on 12 points with 6 wins and 3 seconds followed by TimH on 32 points and PeteW on 34.

Well done to everybody who competed, on a day that challenged your strong wind boat handling skills.

Write up from the Winner on the day Roger Crates