Big breeze a false promise for opening day of Young 88 Nationals

by Melanie Benton, RNZYS on 14 Apr 2012 The Young 88 Fleet started with the promise of 20 knots plus at the briefing for their first race of the their 2012 Harken Young 88 National Championships.

The weather forecast this morning was not so great.

For sailing fans it was a beautiful day on the water – sparking seas and a cool breeze with flat seas. The Young 88 fleet had a different sort of day in mind!

At 8am the weather forecast had 20 knots with a downward trend after 12 noon. Sure enough the wind steadily dropped all day. Race Officer Mike Best sent this report through at 11:46am 'Race One started on time with Danger Zone very close to line but not quite over. It turned into a clean start in 12 to 15kts but we saw a squall of 18-20kts come through during race. We thought we may have a better day than the prediction but it was not to be.'

The second race started with a General Recall so the sequence was started again. This start was a Black Flag start at 11:19. A Black flag start for the uninitiated means if you are over the line you are disqualified from that race. Something the Y88 fleet is familiar with during their sprint series! Race 3 started at 12:32. Breeze was fairly shifty, around 195? 200? at 10 to 13 knots. And Race 4 got under way with light and very shifty winds. Race 5 started at 3:34pm and there was no more racing due to the wind dying completely. A beautiful day for a fish or a cruise – not so much for these highly competitive race boats.

Lion Foundation Youth Training Programme Skipper Jamie Dawson had this to say 'the day had its ups and downs. We started with a good breeze but ended up shifty and light. We won some good shifts and lost a few bad ones. However we won some good splits and in the end had a good day.'

Anthony Leighs from Medium Dry said they didn’t have a good day with a slow start to the regatta and finishing 12th. Normally better in heavy air they had their best results in the light air today. Still they have their drop now and it is all on for tomorrow!

Commodore Ross Masters is disappointed with his day today. Starting with losing their protest flag overboard it went downhill from there. Still on a lighter note Ollie Scott-Mackie from Waka Huia had is 21st birthday today and reckons that is worth a few points!

Tomorrow’s weather forecast is again for light winds – lets hope it is wrong!

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