RS Elite Nationals 2011 at Royal Forth YC – Day 2

by RS Elite Class Association on 23 Jul 2011 RS Elite Nationals 2011 are being hosted by the Royal Forth Yacht Club, Edinburgh from the 21st to 24th July.

Well, the forecast for more breeze today did not come true and, unless your surname was Maclean, it made yesterday's description as 'tense' seem like a comparative walk in the park. Could local knowledge have played a part in Shaun, Donald and Ian Maclean's wins in Elixir in both races? It didn't actually appear to - in very light (sometimes almost drifting) and patchy conditions they simply pulled a downwind rabbit out of their hats after a bad first beat in race four and sailed solidly all through race five.

The Brown's in Aeolus faltered in race four, but salvaged a fifth and then found their own personal travelator on the final run of race five to climb from sixth to second to retain their overall lead with a very smart scoreline after discard.

Team Wadhams / Fisk in RSsailing.com hang on in second overall tonight, but after a frustrating day they have lost points on the leaders and have the Maclean on right their heels, so have much work to do.

Despite the conditions there were some smiling faces this afternoon, including Simon Cavey's team in Livez and Carl Allen's crew in More T Vicar who spent time at the front on the fleet and achieved top four finishes. Simon Brien in Kin will be scratching his head after finishing second and then out of time in the last race of the day. Could it be a first for this talented team?

It could be more of the same conditions tomorrow, but first there is a fleet dinner at Loch Fyne restaurant on the Edinburgh waterfront, so things are all good really!

Overall results after five races:
1st GBR33 Aeolus, Jono Brown, 6pts
2nd GBR55 RSsailing.com, Martin Wadhams, 14pts
3rd 11 Elixir, Shaun Maclean, 15pts
4th IRL50 Sea Breezes, John McDowell, 17pts
5th IRL 61 Kin, Simon Brien, 23pts
6th 53 No Match, Ronnie Millar, 25pts

Full results available online.

http://www.rselite.org" target="_blank">RS Elite Class Association website